Gifts have meant many things over the years. I can still remember the excitement at four when I received a real doll–sized crib for my rather grubby, but beloved doll with the yellow plastic hair that stuck out in every direction. After going to a summer camp at ten, where I had excelled in archery, my prized gift was a bow and arrow set. Here my memory mercifully fades. I cannot remember where in my suburban neighborhood I used this valued gift. I only know it played an important part in my Robin Hood costume next Halloween. As a teenager, clothes were the great gift, a new outfit or two to show off when high school resumed in January.
But now at my age there are fewer and fewer material things that I yearn for. I am not living on some exalted plane, for I do enjoy receiving gifts from family and friends. It is just that they now take a different form. The Christmas decoration made out of popsicle sticks is always treasured, as is a nice note or text from a teenage grandchild. I love a good dinner and conversation with old friends, or a visit from a distant friend with whom I share a past long gone. I love a quiet evening reading with my husband of many years, or a noisy evening filled with children, dogs, and a board game. I love the gift of watching the next generation succeed, or even more important, to fail and get up and try again. And I love watching young minds develop in their own special way with the added gift of having my horizons expanded by this newest generation.
So one of the joys of being at this end of life’s spectrum at this time of year, is that the gifts that one receives are more varied and richer than ever before.