subject: My Unique Family Christmas Tradition [print this page] My Unique Family Christmas Tradition My Unique Family Christmas Tradition
I thought I would share with you one of my most favorite Christmas memories of my childhood. It's "The Legend of Crappy Box" I hope you enjoy it.
Like most families, mine too had it's share of Christmas traditions. When I was a kid after "having Santa Claus" my Mom, Dad & I would either go over to my aunt & uncle's house or they would come to ours and we would spend time together until late at night exchanging gifts, eating, talking and just enjoying being a family. In all there were 8 of us, my Mom, Dad, me, my Nana, Paw-Paw (yes, we ARE a Southern family !) and my aunt, uncle & cousin. My Nana would make her famous sugar candy and there were cakes, pies, and all kinds of good food to eat. We'd sing songs, play games and laugh. Nothing very unusual about that, right? Until one Christmas when a new tradition began.
It all started one Christmas Eve when my Mom & Dad were wrapping presents. They always wrapped presents on Christmas Eve & it was magical to me how they were like a well-oiled machine with the scissors, ribbon & paper. While one was cutting, the other was tying a bow. When one was taping, the other would be getting the next box out to begin the process all over again. I was amazed & sometimes wondered if even Santa's elves could out pace my parents. Sometimes I would help too, joining in the fun while Christmas records played on the stereo (yes, they were vinyl records!) But on one fateful Christmas Eve, the wheels of the great wrapping machine ground to a halt and the process shut down. We were out of Christmas boxes with only one gift left to wrap.
My Dad searched and searched the house. Surely there had to be ONE lonely box left that would serve to wrap ONE lonely gift. It was too late to go out & get more boxes (no 24 hour superstores back then). So what to do? Not to panic because my Dad got the bright idea that there had to be a box up in the attic. Now, to be fair here, there WERE boxes in the attic. Everyone has boxes in the attic, but that night there was just nothing the size of your typical garden variety shirt box that my Nana's new blouse needed so desperately. Mom offered to unwrap one of our gifts for the cause, but Dad, being a guy who loved surprises, was having none of that. He was up there in the attic for a very long time until he finally emerged victorious, a box in hand. Well, yes it was a box. Sort of. Like in another lifetime, maybe.
The box he so happily clutched in his hand looked like it had been through both World Wars, its once sharp corners dented & broken and there were several small holes in it that bore evidence of the bows it had worn from so many Christmases past. It was not the cleanest box you had ever seen either, all dingy and yellow and flattened with a few black marks and scratches to boot. Let me say right here that this was at a time when department store boxes did not fold in or out. They were made of the good solid stuff with real lids and sturdy to a fault. They could and would last years and years so it was obvious that this particular one had seen more than its share of abuse. Needless to say, my Mom did not share in the obvious joy of accomplishment that had now spread across Dad's face. "We can't wrap a gift for someone, let alone my mother in THAT!" Mom laughed. "Sure, we can. I'll clean it and fix it up and it will be fine." Dad assured her. She shook her head in doubt. She was tired and wanted to go to bed. I was pretty tired too even with Santa practically on my doorstep at this point, so we both went to bed while Dad stayed up and worked his magic on the box.
By the next morning with all the excitement and hoopla of Christmas going on, the "box situation" was almost forgotten except for one question from my Mom to my Dad about it to which he simply replied by giving her a big thumbs up and pointed to a perfectly wrapped box under our tree. Nana's present looked just as beautiful as all the others. Crisis averted. Or so we thought.
The rest of the family came over late in the afternoon. We ate Christmas dinner and being the only children of our little group, my cousin and I opened our gifts first. Then it was on to the adults. It was usually at this point where I would resume playing with the new toys that Santa had brought me but for some reason I was very interested in watching my Nana open her gift and Nana always went last. Finally, it was time for her to open her gifts and I kept telling her to open ours. My Mom had an uneasy look on her face, but my Dad was grinning from ear to ear. She tore off the paper carefully and a little too slowly for me. And then I saw it. Nana saw it. We all saw it. The box THAT box. It looked just about as bad as it did last night except it had tons of tape around it and was just maybe a little bit cleaner than it had been before. Nana tried to pretend not to notice and was trying not to laugh and just kept on saying how pretty her blouse was and held it up for everyone to see but she finally had to ask fighting back her laughter "Where did you get this box?" Dad was laughing now too and told her the sad tale of that sad box and how it came to be. He knew she would appreciate the joke. Now we were all laughing and my aunt giggled and said "What a crappy box!" which made us laugh even more. My Mom looked at my Dad who just shrugged and explained that he had done his very best to fix it but that this was as good as that box was ever going to look. We all joked about it and Nana took the box home and Christmas was over for another year.
The next year we all got together again, this time at my aunt and uncle's house. Dinner was served, we ate and it was now again time to open our presents. No one really remembered the box until my Dad as he was opening a gift, laughed and said to my Nana, "Remember that crappy box you got from us last year? What did you do with it?"" He no sooner said that when as he was tearing the paper off his gift, he saw what my Nana had done. I cannot begin to tell you the absolute pure joy that spread across my Dad's face. Now I couldn't even tell you what gift he got from her but it didn't matter because it was in that same old, crappy box with even more tape on it. We all laughed at the irony of it. Nana had kept that box all year and stored it in a special place in her closet just for this moment. I bet she was just like a kid waiting for Christmas to come that year.
That is how the legend and tradition of what my family so lovingly calls "Crappy Box" was born. It might seem crazy to other families who get together sharing that special homemade eggnog or having certain family members hang special ornaments on the tree, etc etc and all that is fine and well but I can tell you that for me "Crappy Box" has been the very best tradition our family has ever had. Each of those next few Christmases as my cousin and I got older, I can't ever remember any of us in our family knowing exactly what gifts each of us received from the other, but I can assure you that all of us knew every single Christmas who got Crappy Box last year and the best part was wondering and hoping that you would be the special one to get it this Christmas. At Thanksgiving each of us would drop hints to the current Crappy Box custodian and would be just as disappointed to not be the chosen one as we would be elated to receive it. By the way, I have received Crappy Box a grand total of nine Christmases now including last Christmas and I'm pretty sure that my aunt and my mother are tied for the record at twelve boxes apiece but they still argue about it. Yup, that's my family alright.
As you might guess, just like Santa, there has been more than one Crappy Box over the years. That first one, as sturdy as they used to make them, would probably just be a little pile of pulp by now. I can't remember how many Crappy Boxes there have been over the years because they do, of course, tend to last awhile. My mother could probably tell you exactly how many because she remembers things like that. We were sorry to see each and every one of them go. Some with rubber bands or even staples to hold them together and most with more tape than cardboard on them and usually bearing the famous faded trademark signatures of real department stores that are now just a distant memory. You could really use some creativity in making that box work out if it was your year to give it to someone. (Hint: Glue sticks, paper clips and safety pins don't work, trust me.) One of them for some reason always had a mismatched top and bottom. All the more reason to make it a perfect match for the Crappy Box title.
At some point, we had to write on the Crappy Box the name of who received it each year because there was some sort of spirited discussion about people being skipped and two people going back and forth with it for a few Christmases. Don't you just love family traditions?
What started out as a last ditch effort to try your best and make something work, turned into a joke and then into a tradition. People who are not in our family shake their heads sometimes when I tell them about Crappy Box. Who wants an old box anyway? But for us, Crappy Box with its crazy and silly name and its even crazier and sillier origins has become much more than just a funny little trick that we play on each other every year. For awhile, without even realizing it, it taught us the true joy and meaning of Christmas. It really didn't matter what came in the box, it was the excitement, the anticipation that this year you might be the one who received it and the fact that you knew that you received it from someone who really thought of you that year as special because they knew that you wanted a chance to have that moment. Haven't we always been told "It's the thought that counts?" How about "not judging a book (or in this case, a box) by its cover? " Our little tradition has taught us even more as the years go by for it is truly an object lesson in patience, humility and life itself. It has taught us that life is fragile and must be cared for. That in this life, you don't throw away something (or someone) just because it seems to have outlived its purpose or it doesn't fit into your plan of perfection. That there just might be another purpose for something or someone that brings joy to others. That things don't really matter, it's the people who love you and are special to you and connected to you that really count. That everyone is special and should be made to feel that way, even if sometimes it's only once a year. And finally and painfully, that nothing lasts forever.
Eight Christmases after Dad first went up into our attic and found that old dirty box, he was taken away from us. Four years later my Nana was gone too and the very next year my Paw-Paw went to be with them. We still have the little pieces of old box tops where they last wrote on them. Those of us that were left didn't want to celebrate Christmas, let alone pass around an old box. No one wanted to laugh but somehow we all made it through the darkness and continued the tradition. Partly because it was Dad who really started the whole thing and my Nana who kept it going, but mostly because we knew how much they and my Paw-Paw enjoyed it. We all did. Through the bittersweet Christmases that followed after each one of them had left us and our little group became smaller, the box passed from one to another as it had before and each time as we laughed through our tears, we felt they were there with us. For I have learned after all these years that it is through traditions, however silly and crazy that they may be, that we keep those that we hold in our hearts alive.
And after all, maybe some things can last forever. There just has to be someone to keep it going long enough and well enough to pass it along to the next generation. I have kids of my own now and they are almost grown, almost ready to go out and make their own mark on this instant gratification, fast food, disposable everything, live for now world. I just wish they could have seen some of the things that I have seen. Brand new record album covers with beautiful artwork that explained exactly who the artist was. Real department stores where people who worked there had done so for years and were experts on what they sold and actually would go look in the back for you if something wasn't out on the displays. Things that weren't mass produced but were crafted, yes crafted, by an actual person, not a machine. Most of all, I really wish that they could have known my Nana, my Paw-Paw and, of course, my Dad. They were great people and I try to keep their memories alive through pictures and stories.
I do happen to know of at least one old thing that my kids have seen many times over the years. It's sitting way back on the top shelf of my closet, just to the left of a bin of summer clothes. It's in pretty rough shape and has a bunch of masking tape around it. It's time for me to take it down, dust it off and get to work on it. Each of my children are hoping to get it for Christmas this year.
