Tear-Jerker Christmas Stories

[DonaCatalina]

Every year these make the rounds on email..........I'm sure everyone has been sent one of these at one time or another............Here's one I got today. No idea if its real or not.

Angels, Once in a While

In September 1960, I woke up one morning with six hungry babies and just 75 cents in my pocket. Their father was gone.

The boys ranged from three months to seven years; their sister was two. Their Dad had never been much more than a presence they feared. Whenever they heard his tires crunch on the gravel driveway they would scramble to hide under their beds. He did manage to leave 15 dollars a week to buy groceries. Now that he had decided to leave, there would be no more beatings, but no food either. If there was a welfare system in effect in southern Indiana at that time, I certainly knew nothing about it.

I scrubbed the kids until they looked brand new and then put on my best homemade dress. I loaded them into the rusty old 51 Chevy and drove off to find a job. The seven of us went to every factory, store and restaurant in our small town. No luck. The kids stayed, crammed into the car and tried to be quiet while I tried to convince whomever would listen that I was willing to learn or do anything. I had to have a job. Still no luck.

The last place we went to, just a few miles out of town, was an old Root Beer Barrel drive-in that had been converted to a truck stop. It was called the Big Wheel. An old lady named Granny owned the place and she peeked out of the window from time to time at all those kids. She needed someone on the graveyard shift, 11 at night until seven in the morning. She paid 65 cents an hour and I could start that night.

I raced home and called the teenager down the street that baby-sat for people. I bargained with her to come and sleep on my sofa for a dollar a night. She could arrive with her pajamas on and the kids would already be asleep. This seemed like a good arrangement to her, so we made a deal.

That night when the little ones and I knelt to say our prayers, we all thanked God for finding Mommy a job.

And so I started at the Big Wheel. When I got home in the mornings I woke the baby-sitter up and sent her home with one dollar of my tip money--fully half of what I averaged every night.

As the weeks went by, heating bills added another strain to my meager wage. The tires on the old Chevy had the consistency of penny balloons and began to leak. I had to fill them with air on the way to work and again every morning before I could go home.

One bleak fall morning, I dragged myself to the car to go home and found four tires in the back seat. New tires! There was no note, no nothing, just those beautiful brand new tires.

Had angels taken up residence in Indiana? I wondered.

I made a deal with the owner of the local service station. In exchange for his mounting the new tires, I would clean up his office. I remember it took me a lot longer to scrub his floor than it did for him to do the tires.

I was now working six nights instead of five and it still wasn't enough. Christmas was coming and I knew there would be no money for toys for the kids. I found a can of red paint and started repairing and painting some old toys. Then I hid them in the basement so there would be something for Santa to deliver on Christmas morning. Clothes were a worry too. I was sewing patches on top of patches on the boys pants and soon they would be too far gone to repair.

On Christmas Eve the usual customers were drinking coffee in the Big Wheel. These were the truckers, Les, Frank, and Jim, and a state trooper named Joe. A few musicians were hanging around after a gig at the Legion and were dropping nickels in the pinball machine. The regulars all just sat around and talked through the wee hours of the morning and then left to get home before the sun came up. When it was time for me to go home at seven o'clock on Christmas morning I hurried to the car. I was hoping the kids wouldn't wake up before I managed to get home and get the presents from the basement and place them under the tree. (We had cut down a small cedar tree by the side of the road down by the dump.)

It was still dark and I couldn't see much, but there appeared to be some dark shadows in the car--or was that just a trick of the night? Something certainly looked different, but it was hard to tell what. When I reached the car I peered warily into one of the side windows. Then my jaw dropped in amazement. My old battered Chevy was full--full to the top with boxes of all shapes and sizes.

I quickly opened the driver's side door, scrambled inside and kneeled in the front facing the back seat. Reaching back, I pulled off the lid of the top box. Inside was a whole case of little blue jeans, sizes 2-10! I looked inside another box: It was full of shirts to go with the jeans. Then I peeked inside some of the other boxes: There were candy and nuts and bananas and bags of groceries. There was an enormous ham for baking, and canned vegetables and potatoes. There was pudding and Jell-O and cookies, pie filling and flour. There was a whole bag of laundry supplies and cleaning items.

And there were five toy trucks and one beautiful little doll.

As I drove back through empty streets as the sun slowly rose on the most amazing Christmas Day of my life, I was sobbing with gratitude. And I will never forget the joy on the faces of my little ones that precious morning.

Yes, there were angels in Indiana that long-ago December. And they all hung out at the Big Wheel truck stop.

--Barb Irwin

[KeeperoftheBar]

One Christmas Eve when I was about 5 my family was driving to my Grandparents house about 150 miles away.  It had to be after 10 PM when I commented that I forgot to ask Santa for a "Johnny Reb" cannon. (A big plastic one that shot black ping pong balls).  The next morning, the first gift I opened happened to be a Johnny Reb cannon.   No one could convince me that Santa Claus didn't evesdrop but I had no idea how he heard us in the pickup. 

[Randal]

Here's one that I received just this morning:

I remember my first Christmas adventure with Grandma. I was just a kid. I remember tearing across town on my bike to visit her on the day my big sister dropped the bomb: "There is no Santa Claus," she jeered. "Even dummies know that!"

My Grandma was not the gushy kind, never had been. I fled to her that day because I knew she would be straight with me. I knew Grandma always told the truth, and I knew that the truth always went down a whole lot easier when swallowed with one of her "world-famous" cinnamon buns.. I knew they were world-famous, because Grandma said so. It had to be true.

Grandma was home, and the buns were still warm. Between bites, I told her everything. She was ready for me. "No Santa Claus?" she snorted.... "Ridiculous! Don't believe it. That rumor has been going around for years, and it makes me mad, plain mad!! Now, put on your coat, and let's go."

"Go? Go where, Grandma?" I asked. I hadn't even finished my Second World-famous cinnamon bun. "Where" turned out to be Kerby's General Store, the one store in town that had a little bit of just about everything. 


As we walked through its doors, Grandma handed me ten dollars. That was a bundle in those days. "Take this money," she said, "and buy something for someone who needs it. I'll wait for you in the car." Then she turned and walked out of Kerby's.


I was only eight years old. I'd often gone shopping with my mother, but never had I shopped for anything all by myself. The store seemed big and crowded, full of people scrambling to finish their Christmas shopping. For a few moments I just stood there, confused, clutching that ten-dollar bill, wondering what to buy, and who on earth to buy it for. I thought of everybody I knew: my family, my friends, my neighbors, the kids at school, the people who went to my church. I was just about thought out, when I suddenly thought of Bobby Decker. He was a kid with bad breath and messy hair, and he sat right behind me in Mrs. Pollock's grade-two class.

Bobby Decker didn't have a coat. I knew that because he never went out to recess during the winter. His mother always wrote a note, telling the teacher that he had a cough, but all we kids knew that Bobby Decker didn't have a cough; he didn't have a good coat. I fingered the ten-dollar bill with growing excitement. I would buy Bobby Decker a coat! I settled on a red corduroy one that had a hood to it. It looked real warm, and he would like that.

"Is this a Christmas present for someone?" the lady behind the counter asked kindly, as I laid my ten dollars down. "Yes, ma'am," I replied shyly. "It's for Bobby." The nice lady smiled at me, as I told her about how Bobby really needed a good winter coat. I didn't get any change, but she put the coat in a bag, smiled again, and wished me a Merry Christmas.

That evening, Grandma helped me wrap the coat (a little tag fell out of the coat, and Grandma tucked it in her Bible) in Christmas paper and ribbons and wrote, "To Bobby, From Santa Claus" on it. Grandma said that Santa always insisted on secrecy. Then she drove me over to Bobby Decker's house, explaining as we went that I was now and forever officially, one of Santa's helpers.

Grandma parked down the street from Bobby's house, and she and I crept noiselessly and hid in the bushes by his front walk. Then Grandma gave me a nudge. "All right, Santa Claus," she whispered, "get going." I took a deep breath, dashed for his front door, threw the present down on his step, pounded his door and flew back to the safety of the bushes and Grandma. Together we waited breathlessly in the darkness for the front door to open. Finally it did, and there stood Bobby. 


Fifty years haven't dimmed the thrill of those moments spent shivering, beside my Grandma, in Bobby Decker's bushes. That night, I realized that those awful rumors about Santa Claus were just what Grandma said they were, ridiculous.  Santa was alive and well, and we were on his team.

I still have the Bible, with the coat tag tucked inside: $19.95.

May you always have LOVE to share, HEALTH to spare and FRIENDS that care. And may you always believe in the magic of Santa Claus!

[Sir Ironhead]

Whenever I'm told or hear that there is no Santa, I tell this story:

When I was a little kid we had two, and sometimes three, Christmases, one with my father's side of the family who were mostly all within an hours drive, one with my mothers side, about a five hour drive away and the third at home.  One year, two days before Christmas, we drove the 5 hours to Grandma Annies house and my brother and I were told that we would leave for home Christmas afternoon.  I was concerned that Santa would not know where we were and was told that maybe Santa will leave our presents with Betty, the neighbor lady.  When we got home about 10 o'clock Christmas night, we found the lights on the tree lit, they were off we when left, and all sorts of gifts under the tree.  Of course my brother and I were overjoyed as it seemed that Santa had found us.  My parents commented that Betty had done a great job when it suddenly occured to me that she had left a week earlier to see her grandkids.  In Texas.  And she was going to be gone for a month.  There was NO WAY she could have done this and I said so.  Mom and Dad just looked at each other, than me and shrugged their shoulders.  For the past 35 years no one has been able to convince me that Santa was not responsible.

[Lord Figaro]

When I was young I would love to sneak down the stairs and peek under the tree real early in the morning. Just to see if Santa had come yet. One Christmas morning I got up, looked at my clock and saw that it was 3 am. Well that was to early for me to go play with anything. But it wouldn't hurt to go look. So I snuk past my mother and fathers room, and creeped down the stairs. Being careful to step on the edges so they don't squeak, and wake anyone up. Looking over the banister and into the next room where we kept our tree, but Santa hadn't come yet. I got up every hour from that point and kept checking. But no Santa. Finally I got up at around 7am, and poof. There they were, all the presents neatly stuffed under the tree. Waiting for my sister and I to open them. That was some pretty sneaky work by Santa if ever there was one, cuz I sure don't remember going back to sleep, but I didn't hear any noises to say someone was down stairs.

[DonaCatalina]

I got another one today:
Steve had little patience with people, and he didn't have much more with puppies, either. He preferred, on the whole, the adult dogs. Puppies, however, came in after the holidays, because people found out: 
they were allergic 
the puppy was too hard to train 
the puppy was too much work 
the landlord didn't allow puppies 
the landlord didn't allow puppies that were going to be BIG 
the puppy barked too much 
the puppy wasn't the kind of dog they wanted.

This list could have been elaborated on, over and over. But I watched Steve's face as he faced the man in the lobby, the man who was brining in the puppy for adoption 8 days before Christmas. 
Steve was our 'dog' person. He was the one who in general, was the 'expert', and I liked him alot. Tall, laconic, dry witted, and incredibly intelligent, he had gotten to the point with many people where they tried what little was left of his patience. As I leaned against the counter, I had a feeling this would be one of them. 
"You see;" the man holding the puppy was saying "We just found out we can't have dogs where we are. We got the puppy from my friend, Joe, who works with me downtown. He got the puppy from this guy he knew who got it for his kid, but the kid was allergic, and he got the puppy from someone who had gotten the puppy from this lady who got it for a present from her kids, but she was too old to take care of it and figured it would be a good present for someone with kids. We figured that, too. She's a nice little puppy." 
The nice little puppy was beautiful, slightly longish white fur. She was obviously a mix. 
She was only about 9 weeks old. She was cowering in fear, with huge dark eyes, and I could see the confusion there. She looked in good shape, but emotionally, I wondered where she was. She was very young, and she had already been through more homes than many adult dogs. 
Steve looked at me, and I shrugged. "I'll have the vet examine her, and if she checks out, we'll take her." he told the man, taking the puppy. 
"What an idiot." Was Steve's remark as we leaned across the exam table in the clinic. The puppy sat there, quivering, obviously terrified of yet one more strange thing in her life. Dr. Morris gently gave her a once over, and gave her the thumbs up for adoption, but suggested she remain in the clinic a couple days, as she was a little underweight, probably from stress. 
We told the man we'd be taking the puppy, and he looked relieved. He handed us a small leash and a box of biscuits. "Her name is Candy." he said, as we parted company. 
Steve came and sat beside me at the desk. He looked gloomy and morose. "I wish people wouldn't think that getting a dog for Christmas is a great idea...it just makes the pet stores profit and the puppies wind up...if they are lucky...like that one there." 
I agreed. Every year we saw alot of the same thing. Candy's difference was that she came before Christmas, and that was at least a small change. 
The next day Dr. Morris called me. "This puppy doesn't know how to eat much on her own, Fyre. I think that must have been taken away from her mother too young. Someone's going to have to watch her eat, and help urge her along. I don't think she should go to just anyone...make sure the home she gets they have alot of time to spend with her." 
People were coming in like crazy for puppies and kittens, but it was not our policy to adopt right before the holidays, which were too stressful for most puppies and kittens. This seemed to agree with Candy, who got to know our staff, and in two days time was romping in the small back room with 2 of our cats who liked dogs. 
That afternoon, Steve was asked to pick out a dog or a puppy to take with him to do an educational presentation at the Greenpoint Library. The lecture, to kids and their parents, was why you shouldn't get a pet for the holidays. Steve wanted to take an older dog, but being he needed a dog he could fit in the small car that belonged to our handyman, he reluctantly decided on Candy. 
Steve got there, got set up, and spoke with the library staff, who were animal lovers, about the shelter, all of who admired the puppy. Candy, in her days with us, wasn't as shy as she had been, but Steve took great pains to make sure the puppy was comfortable. He put her into a large carrier to nap til they were ready for her, and he set up for the 'talk'. 
The audience that filtered in were made up of adults and kids of all ages. They took seats in the kids library, and Steve watched them with irony, wondering how many would really listen to him. 
He was introduced by the Head Librarian and had just begun to talk when he noticned a slight disturbance in the back of the room. A man was entering, pushing a wheelchair with a child in it. Steve noticed the little girl, who looked to be about 10, had a scarf over her head and looked very pale. They took their place near the side and Steve noticed they were very attentive. 
A few mintues into the presentation, Steve lifted out Candy from her box. There was a chorus of 'ooohs' and 'aaahhhs' but from the side there came a small scream. Steve turned and saw the man, his face white, clutching the girl's hand. The girl looked as if she was seeing a ghost. 
"It's her, dad!!!! It's her." the childs voice was filled with anguish, and Steve and everyone turned to look at the man. He was white faced and obviously shaken. The little girl was crying, reaching out her arms. "Oh, please, please let me hold her. She's mine, she's mine!" 
There was dead silence in the room. Steve looked at the man and held up his hand to the group. He went over to the man, and settled the puppy in the little girls lap. She buried her face in the puppie's fur and Candy turned and began to lick her ear. Her scarf slipped and Steve could see she had no hair. The man reached out and squeezed her hand, then looked up at Steve. "We can discuss this when I'm done." Steve said, not knowing what else to do. Despite his jaded nature, he felt a lump in his throat, and the rest of the lecture was delivered with a paced warmth and more acceptance than probably anything else he'd done. At the end, he let the children come up and gently pet the puppy where it sat in the little girl's lap. The little girl showed them how to pet the little animal, gently, and held some of the smaller children's hands. When the lecture was over, after Steve had fielded several questions about the shelter, he went back to the man and his daughter. The little girl smiled up at him through tear streaked lashes. "Thank you for bringing her to me! I knew I'd see her again! I just knew it!" 
Steve turned to the man, who gave him a desperate look. He led him to the side of the library. "Please let us adopt this puppy. This must be a miracle." 
He paused and looked at Steve. "You see, a few weeks ago we answered an ad about someone who had puppies for adoption. Ann....my daughter....she has cancer. For Christmas she asked for a puppy, and we thought it would be a good idea. My wife and I had wanted a dog too, and Ann, well, it seemed to be an incentive for her to not give up, too, you know? We picked out this puppy, and the woman said she'd hold it for us til the puppy was a little older. It was still nursing and being taken care of by it's mother. We gave the woman our number, and told her to call us. We figured she would. But two weeks later when I called, she told me she had sold the whole litter. We tried to find out more, but she wouldn't tell me anything. 
It devestated my daughter. She's been sort of having a hard time with things. I didn't think she'd ever get over it. She prayed for that puppy....." 
He began to cry. Steve did too. He had a lump in his throat. He shook his head. "Come back to the shelter with me. You'll have to do the paperwork to make it offical." 
That afternoon, Candy, renamed Holly, went home in the arms of a little girl who thanked us for being angels. Her parents, who had both come in, hugged us in tears. 
A year later Steve came upstairs and handed me an envelope. There was a Christmas card inside with a pretty young blond girl sitting on a sofa, her arms around a silky snow coated dog, with a red collar around it's neck. 
"Merry Christmas from Anne and her sister, Holly." the card read. "I feel better now, Steve, because of you. I will always take good care of Holly. Love, Ann." 
It was the only time I'd ever seen Steve cry.