Two Turtle Doves

DOVEThe best Christmas gift I ever received wasn’t a Christmas gift at all, but a spontaneous, compassionate gesture from a friend of a friend.  When I was a kid, if you came running into the house all hot and sweaty from playing outside in the Florida heat, it was a good bet you could find my mom in front of her sewing machine, probably with some Anne Murray playing on the stereo.

She, like her mother before her, made things:  all of our curtains and throw pillows, assorted matching dresses for my sisters, dolls and Santas, bunnies and birds.  The tip of the middle finger on her left hand was a rough, pitted mess from hand-stitching quilts from leftover fabrics that were stacked in bins in her sewing room.  When she brushed and smoothed my hair, that finger would always snag and catch on a few strands.

She sold some of these creations in a local shop and did some by special order for weddings or showers.  Old metal tins full of buttons and other sewing notions were stacked on the shelf above her machine.  My dad, always handy, made a pegboard where she hung ribbon, thread, and other mysterious trappings of her craft like scissors with notched edges, bobbins, and colored chalk for marking patterns.  He fashioned a whole organized storage system out of little International Coffee tins, which were mounted on a shelf, their plastic lids revealing the contents.   I would sit reading or doodling at her feet listening to the rhythmic buzz-buzz-buzz of the sewing machine as she worked.  I imagined stories of British children named Simplicity and Butterick, named after the patterns filed in boxes under her table.  We’d spend hours like this, until she’d glance at the clock and see it was almost time for my father to get home.  She’d push aside what she’d been working on and head for the kitchen to start dinner.

I never learned a single stitch.  In junior high I had a home economics class (do they even have those anymore?) where I had to make an item of clothing.  My halter top was uneven and hung crooked, and that was after hours of tears of anger and frustration.   She did manage to show me how to sew on a button, my one sewing ability.  But sitting at the sewing machine and pushing that foot pedal that made the needle go up and down at a dizzying speed reminded me of my father’s table saw and conjured thoughts of heinous injuries.   I just couldn’t do it.

Twenty-one years ago in October we lost mom to cancer.  Two months later it was Christmas time and unthinkable to get together for family celebrations without her.  I was mopey and depressed, angry that people had the nerve to just keep marching right on shopping and baking and decorating when for me, the whole world had just come to a screeching halt.  Joy to the World?  No way.

My best friend was home for the holiday, and we ended up at her house.  I think we were supposed to pick some of her sister’s friends up and go see a movie, not that there was anything worth seeing.  The Edlin’s lived across the street from my friend.  We walked over in the cold December night and knocked on their festive holiday door.  I tried my best to be friendly, or at least civil, while we waited for everyone to get their coats.   I felt isolated and lonely, even (or especially) amid the crowd, and I wandered off to look at their Christmas tree sparkling in the corner.

Mrs. Edlin (Helen) must have seen me there and she came over to give me a hug.  It was then I noticed them.  On her tree were two of my mother’s doves–one red, one white.  Immediately I was transported back to underneath the sewing machine, seeing my mother’s hand-drawn patterns of the little birds and the bin of  wings just waiting to be attached.  “Oh!” I said, “My mom made those!”  They were some of her best sellers–all sold out around town.

She nodded.  “I found them at the shop by the park,” she said.  “They were so cute.”  I didn’t register what she was doing as she unhooked them from the tree.  She held the pair of doves in her hands.  “Of course you need these,” she said, holding them out to me.

She had no idea as she handed them over that she’d just given me back Christmas.  That simple, unselfish gesture melted some of the ice that had been growing steadily thicker around my heart.  Without words,  I gave her a tearful hug as a thank you, completely inadequate considering what she’d just handed me.

Every year since then, I open the boxes as they come down from the attic and search for the doves.  They are the first to go on the tree.  Sometimes you don’t even notice them, nestled in the branches, but I know they’re there.   On quiet evenings when it’s just me at home with a good book, I’ll sit by the tree and admire the twinkling lights and ornaments.  When I see the doves perched in the tree, of course I always think of mom, her talent and creativity.  But I also think of Mrs. Edlin.  I’d like her to know I’m paying it forward.   I try each year to give spontaneously and unselfishly, often to someone I hardly know.  I’ve heard a lot lately that you never know how some small thing you do might be a giant thing in someone else’s life.  The thing is that I know that very well.   Once upon a time my Christmas miracle was two turtle doves.