The First Gift of Christmas

Today Soren and I walked Scott to the train stop a little earlier than usual. It was very very cold. Soren was wrapped snugly up in a blanket with a hand-knit hat on his head when we started the trip but, due to his irrepressible need for constant motion, he was free of both hat and blanket by the time we began the walk back. His little socks were slipping off his feet, his nose was bright red, and standing tears were nearly frozen in his eyes.

I wrapped my enormous Hufflepuff scarf around his little body for extra warmth while we waited at the last crosswalk.

When it was our turn to cross, Phyllis the crossing guard, who had been standing on the opposite street corner, pulled out her big orange sign to escort across the street. Once we were on the other side, she pulled an oversized Christmas bag out of her wire buggy.

"Someone left this here with me this morning with instructions to give it to the first mother and baby I saw," she said, passing the gift bag to me.

"Thank you," I gushed, very flustered and curious.

"Well, it's not from me," she said, smiling.

"Soren, do you want to see what you got?" I asked in an animated voice to my swaddled but still shivering son. I opened the bag and almost wanted to cry.

There was an enormous fur hat with ear flaps, two tiny pairs of mittens, warm 12-month-sized booties, and a weather protection cover for the stroller.

I had worried that it was getting too cold for Soren and I to walk with Scott in the mornings anymore. But because of the generosity of a stranger, we all went out the next day and Soren was the warmest of us all.