A box full of hope…that’s what Christmas is all about

Hope is the thing with feathers
That perches in the soul
And sings the tune without the words
And never stops at all
—Emily Dickinson

I always loved the past.

I grew up in an 1880’s row house and I know the feel of the 19th century right down to its smell. So that’s how I started to think about the past.

I can still recall that old place—how the floor of the dirt cellar would go damp as the ancient creek beneath it would come back to life whenever it rained.

It fascinated—even obsessed me that the past wasn’t far away—but just under our feet.

And the more I thought about it, I figured out something else; the future had to be suspended above our heads. Now, that was a real shocker.

I’m still trying to wrap my mind around that.

Who knows? Maybe someday, when the present is buried like that ancient creek, someone might come along, dig us up and give us a look-see.

I know that’s a curious point of view, but it’s an example of how I think.

I suppose that kind of thinking led me to collecting old clocks and before long, I opened this antique shop called Antiques In Time.

Over the years, I’ve been all over North America tracking down antique timepieces, and in the pursuit of my passion, ended up in Brooklyn one rainy day bidding on the contents of a storage unit.

It was an educated guess that led me there.

Walter Abercrombie owned an antiquarian bookstore—an island of culture in a joyless wasteland of commercial buildings, and he occasionally came across some lovely finds which he passed on to me, for a price, of course.

Walter passed away on a Thanksgiving weekend—Black Friday, to be precise, and the heirs of his estate auctioned off all his stock. I knew he owned the storage locker and was hoping I might make one last find.

I bought the contents for a mere two hundred dollars, but when the locker was opened, it contained only a chest filled with antique Victorian Christmas tree ornaments–long-tailed birds. I knew nothing of their provenance, or why Walter even bothered to pay rent to store them.

I was chagrined, but now owned a share of a Dicken’s Christmas fantasy.

So, that first Christmas I put a pine tree in the store, and decorated it with the bird ornaments. There were about three-dozen tin clip-on candle holders also and I felt I had to use them to add to the charm.

When the candles were lit, the effect was magic. People crowded around the window of the shop gazing in at the beauty of the glowing birds and my walk-in business tripled during the time the tree was up.

But then, a curious thing happened. One of my customers, who often browsed but never bought, seemed obsessed by the tree. She came in every day on her lunch and would stand there staring in awe.

I struck up a conversation with her, and over the course of a week learned her sad tale. It turned out she had been seeing a man and the engagement fell through. She had been quite despondent, even to the point of contemplating suicide, but when she saw the tree, her depression lifted.

She had been coming in daily because as she told me, it was the only thing that kept her going.

That’s when I got the inspiration.

I gave her an ornament—a long-tailed bird. They were popular in Dicken’s time because they were seen on Queen Victoria’s tree.

The woman was overjoyed with the gift and left with a beautiful light in her eyes. When I saw her three months later, she was engaged again and very happy.

This event was not a singular occurrence, but happened regularly over the years.

Invariably, a sad or lonely person would be drawn to the tree and make a daily pilgrimage to view it. I would gift them with a bird ornament, and their fortunes would change.

In twenty years of decorating the tree, the pattern repeated itself exactly, every time.

Now, I’m not attaching magical properties to the ornaments, but I do know that things often become infused with an aura.

Most people say this is nonsense, but I disagree. For instance, I don’t know anybody who would wear a sweater worn by a serial killer or rapist. Well, isn’t that the same thing—the belief that some object has been blessed or contaminated by the owner’s spirit in some way?

All I know is that everyone to whom I’ve given an ornament has been blessed.

I’ve thought and thought about this over the years and I’ve come to agree with the views of G. K. Chesterton who wrote a delightful essay called The Logic of Elfland. In the essay Chesterton says:

My first and last philosophy, that which I believe in with unbroken certainty, I learnt in the nursery. Old nurses do not tell children about the grass, but about the fairies that dance on the grass; and the old Greeks could not see the trees for the dryads.

He goes on to prove that the logic of fairy tales is not only reasonable, but also necessary, and I totally agree.

All fairy tales begin the same way—Once upon a time, and all end—and they lived happily ever after.

You see, it’s all about hope—that’s what keeps us going even when we can’t seem to find our way.

I give the gift of hope—a reminder that even a tiny bird can make it through the longest winter if it continues to sing.

Those feathered ornaments perched on a tree remind me of the birds—enduring the harshest storms, yet never asking a crumb from me

Image source: Google images