A Childhood Christmas Memory

Barbie was the basis of my existence about twenty years ago. She was everything I dreamed I would grow up to be, never mind that I was scrawny with muddy brown hair and eyes like a hoot owl. As Christmas approached the memory of my parent's recent divorce faded with the last colors of the fall and the promise of fresh snow and a new year had my little heart filling with wishes. I simply knew that the giant box with the big red bow that I had been staring at under the Christmas tree belonged to me and inside I would find the new bright red Barbie Ferrari. I envisioned myself pushing Barbie down the driveway, her beautiful blonde hair flowing behind her, taking us both far away from the red clay of West Virginia.

With the arrival of Christmas Eve came the whining from myself and my brother to open a gift. We would begin softly, moaning about the unfairness of being made to wait until morning and promising that allowing us to open just one gift would be enough to ease our anticipation. Soon our pleading gave way to wailing until my mother's patience gave way to exhaustion and we were allowed to open one gift each.

I raced to the tree and grabbed the box with the red bow, sheer joy within my grasp. Before I could rip the paper to shreds my mother called out a warning, "Sarah, are you sure you should pick that one?" I screeched to a halt. Oh no, maybe I was wrong. Maybe the box did not hold Barbie's hot little car after all. My stomach twisted into knots. What should I do? I had been banking on this box for weeks. There was no other present big enough under the tree. It had to be that one, or else that meant it wasn't coming at all. Surely not.

I glanced at my brother, smiling knowingly at me. "Open it,"he smirked. "You'll love it. I promise. I helped pick it out." Here stood my big brother, master of all things cool. If he truly did pick it out, then it had to be fantastic simply by default. But while in my eyes he may have set the standard for cool, this was the same boy that sold me toilet water to guard against monsters in the night and forced me to trade my allowance for a violin he cut out of cardboard. This was the boy that made me go down the Slip-N- Slide first to check for rocks underneath it. This was the boy that introduced me to the word cruel.

I decided that even he couldn't be that cold on Christmas. I ripped the paper off while my mother's eyes dropped with what looked like pity. My brother clapped with delight. Nowhere on the box I held did I read the name Barbie. In fact it was just plain cardboard. I peeled back the top to reveal a hot pink snowsuit, complete with gloves and boots. My head swam with disappointment. "Well, try it on," was all that my mother could offer.

Later that night I sat perched on the arm of the couch wearing my pink snowsuit, looking like the Easter bunny minus the ears, and watched my brother play with his brand new Nintendo. I wished desperately that I could have one of those flowers that allowed Mario to throw fireballs. That would fix my rotten brother. Of course I considered myself lucky that he was letting me watch, Lord knew I would never be allowed to play it. Occasionally my brother would glance back at me, sitting in my giant ball of pink puff, and snicker.

The next morning I raced to the living room to find that Santa had not forgotten me. Illegally parked on the couch cushion was a gleaming red Ferrari, complete with Barbie waiting to ride off into the sunset. The sight of her and that car brought back my hope for the future. Once again life held promises that I had yet to discover. The short days of winter would lengthen into spring and the world would become an open road for Barbie and me, but just in case we hit a few patches of rough weather along the way, Mom had made sure I was armed with the proper travel attire.