One more Christmas story at least before I go back to Real Estate. The picture has no real connection to the story except I love getting together with my family over the holidays.
One year I had already bought my Mom something for Christmas and delivered it (I can’t remember what that Christmas gift was). Two days before Christmas I was in a grocery store and saw a nice little guide book for birds in our area and it was on sale real cheap. I remembered Mom commenting that she wished she knew the name of some of those beautiful birds in her backyard, so I bought it for her.
I was in college and didn’t have much money and Mom knew it (because most of the money I had came from her and Dad). I had to decide what I would tell her about why I was bringing over a second present. I got to thinking about how the day before Christmas was Christmas Eve and decided that the day before that was Christmas Adam! Since I felt I was making up a holiday I decided I could make up rules of etiquette for the holiday as well. I decided that on Christmas Adam you can give a gift but you are never expected to. If you do want to give a Christmas Adam present it needs to be something very special for the person, and that no gift is expected in return. I wrote all this in the front of the bird book and gave it to Mom. She loved the bird book and loved the idea, so she told everyone about it. On Christmas each year when our family gets together there is at least one person that has a good story about some little gift they gave to someone and how they explained “Christmas Adam” to them. These are always fun stories.
A few years later my grandfather fell and was hospitalized a few days just before Christmas. Mom called us to come to her house and have Christmas early because she would leave for Shelby County the next day to be with her Dad. While we were opening presents on the night of the 23rd she got a call that he had died. His funeral was the day after Christmas. A large Sanctuary was full with even an overflow of more people standing in the back and there had not yet even been an obituary in the paper. My Grandfather had lived almost a century worth of healthy happy years, had lots of good friends, and had passed away with very little pain. I always felt that was a Christmas Adam present from God to my Grandfather.
