Growing up an only child, it wasn’t very difficult to determine which gifts under the tree belonged to me. The obvious answer was, all of them. Even knowing this, the anticipation of Christmas morning was still very much alive. My mother was the one in charge of Christmas in our household. She would do all the purchasing of gifts, the wrapping and placement under the tree. She would always get me exactly what I had asked for, with on occasion some surprise gifts as well. One such surprise came when I was 12 years old. Only this gift was from my father. Dad, along with his brother, my uncle, went and found an old beat up single shot shotgun at a local pawn shop. This shot gun had been painted red and green, with a scratched up shoulder stock as well. But, my Dad and my uncle took the gun apart, cleaned and repaired it, restoring it to like new. Dad then placed this shotgun under the tree the night before Christmas. On Christmas morning, as I opened up boxes of toys, clothes and video games, I finally made my way to one of my last gifts. It was a tall skinny package wrapped in green paper with a simple note that read, "To Kevin, From Dad". As I unwrapped this gift, I began to realize what it was. My first real gun. My mom was not happy about this, but she knew my father would teach me how to handle it. Dad looked at me and said, "Be careful with this gun. It’s not a toy". I still have this shotgun today. I have hunted with it and done plenty of target shooting too. Every time I take it out of the gun cabinet, it reminds me of the two men that put in a lot of work to make a young boy happy. Christmas is about Jesus, it’s about family and it’s about making memories that will last forever. That’s my Christmas Story……
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