The Christmas Angel - the story version.

The Christmas Angel



Late one night in the toy store, the old man trimmed his tree
with ornaments all made out of wood, all carved through his artistry…
Little toy soldiers at attention stood guarding the Christmas Spirit
And golden bells chimed their song so true that you could feel it.

Mr. Nicholas Angelino was a large, rotund man with pure white hair that curled around his shoulders. Yes, there were spectacles balanced on the tip of his long nose and yes, he had eyes of a winter-blue sky, but although one might make comparisons to a certain other gentleman, one never did that twice around him. He truly didn’t like being compared to any sort of a ‘Santa’ man because he was just himself, a wood carver with a heart of pure gold and a mind that truly listened.

A fire always burned in his workshop in our small village. There were always wood scraps on the floor and shelves lining the walls were crowded with tops and bears, miniature toys, and great staves with figures, faces, and designs carved into them. He had an immense rocking chair fashioned of old, knotty branches, polished to a honeyed glow that was where I usually found him. Seemed he always had a bit or chunk of wood in his hands. Those hands always fascinated me. They were large and calloused and becoming more arthritic as the years went by, but he still was able to carve. He always used to hold a piece of wood; he’d caress it, talk to it, musing about what it just might become with a nick here or there, with it shaped, smoothed, rounded, or split. He'd explain how knots were formed and how colder or warming seasons would add character to the wood; telling us how storms and droughts all had an effect in shaping the trees.

Mr. Angelino was something of a Pied Piper in our town and at his feet, we’d sit listening to his stories, unknowingly being inspired and taught about what he called ‘small lessons’ which ‘wood’ –no, tis not misspelled, influence our lives. No one really believed that, but we came and sat and learned, nonetheless. It was safe, secure, and warm. Never too busy to listen to anyone’s thoughts or fears, he’d then spin a story or carve something which would lead us to finding our answers.

One spring, when I had just turned nine, I stopped going in to see Mr. Angelino. I’d been in a car accident, (this was long before seatbelts) and had flown face-first through the windshield of the car. Clear glass blocked the light from my world for months, bandages were eventually removed to show scars that would take years and more surgeries to fade. The internal scars would take far longer.

When at last I was able to have the bandages around my eyes removed, my vision was forever altered. Thick coke-bottle glasses allowed me to see and for days I relished the fact that once again I could see at all. But the kids at school couldn’t understand what it meant to see again. They simply did not understand. At the time when a girl needs to feel pretty, I was not. Ragged red scars still lined my face, my glasses were terribly thick and I was insecure. I became the butt of everyone’s jokes, I was laughed at and teased and I was miserable. I would see him come to his toyshop door and watch as I walked down the street towards home after school. He never pushed at me to come in and he always had a kind, if concerned smile. I knew even he couldn’t fix this.

I spent much time that summer and autumn alone. As summer heat baked leaves to brown, as the weather cooled, as the first snowflakes flew, I turned to books, to writing, to unspoken dreams and I never had any notion that he did know and did understand.

Every year at the toy store, the old man trimmed his tree,
every year he carved a new angel to crown the top for all to see.
He must have had fifty from previous years; each one a masterpiece:
all of them different, all of them carved and each one a herald of Christmas Peace.

Usually, Mr. Angelino would put up the tree in his front window right after Thanksgiving. But that year he didn’t. It was almost Christmas before the tree appeared at all and each day more and more ornaments showed up in its branches. The window out front was one made out of many small panes of glass, some beveled and others with bits of stained glass instead. We always had a special tree lighting ceremony for Mr. Angelino’s tree. His tree didn’t have lights on it. It had hundreds of small candles that he’d light instead. He’d always start at the bottom and light his way up the tree to those that shined brightly surrounding the current year’s angel.

I didn’t even want to go to the tree lighting that Christmas Eve, but my parents insisted. They were off with some friends during the carol sing. It was snowing again and this was one of those magical snows with the big, fat, fluffy flakes. It had been snowing on and off all day and there was enough snow for the inevitable snowballs to be flying around. It seemed that many of them were aimed at me, and while part of me wanted to hide away, now, the excitement of the tree lighting had gotten a hold of me and I was glad I had come. Still, I wasn’t up front like I usually tried to be and was towards the back to avoid being hit.

Voices quieted as he began lighting the bottom branches. It was dark outside and dark in his shop so with each additional candle, more and more of the tree could finally be seen. Little kids pointed at various ornaments. People mentioned ones that were always their favorites. He’d lit perhaps half the tree at this point and there was almost a deep expectancy stilling the crowd of people outside his store. Each round of candles lighting higher and higher on the tree made the people watching outside almost vibrate with excitement.

A snowball caught me in the back of the head. Three or four of the older boys were around the corner of the shop. I could see their shadowed bodies and hear their whispered voices calling to ‘four-eyed-bug eyes.’

The whole magical feeling I’d been experiencing drained out of me to puddle in the melted snow at my feet. I couldn’t begin to understand why after all these months that I was still being teased so. Instead of being happy and joyous, I felt small and dirty. It didn’t seem to matter if I ignored them or ran away or fought back. The kids just refused to understand that what they did hurt. No, not the hurt of a snowball in the head sort of hurt, but the cold, deep inside of me, helpless pain of being forever the outsider.

I looked back towards the toy shop window, but people were crowded in and I couldn’t see the tree at all. But I heard something strange and now people were moving aside. People had turned and were looking at me. They were pointing and smiling. I didn’t understand. People shuffled around so that now there was a path to the front of the crowd. Feeling embarrassed and foolish, I edged closer. Someone, off on one side began singing Silent Night, voices joined in and now people were almost pulling me to the front. I stopped in front of the window and looked up at the tree. Suddenly, I understood. My back straightened. My chin came up. With tears streaming, I took a deep breath and joined in the singing. I looked at Mr. Angelino through the many-paned windows and smiled the first real smile I had in months. He knew that I knew that he’d known all along.

There on top of the Christmas Tree,
carved with a message for the masses,
was a beautiful smiling angel
wearing a thick pair of glasses!