My Greatest Christmas Gift

In Dolly’s heart I was always the baby, never having to relinquish my status with her. Even when I left her home to share my mom’s brand new world. I always felt like the treasured little girl I was raised to be.

My mom met and married a man that she knew would be the perfect supporter of her little girl. I began my new adventure with them when I was seven years old. Two and a half years later my mom and dad, as I called her husband, welcomed a new baby girl, Kendra. In our younger years I felt the need to compete with Kendra with my mom and new dad. A Christmas Eve baby, Kendra had a sprinkling of bright red hair and sparkling grayish blue eyes. She fit into the mold of my new family, where I may not have. My mom and dad also had red hair. I looked like a square peg in a round hole with my dark eyes and hair. Kendra was not an overly beautiful baby. Her head was a bit too square and her expressions a bit too serious. Her face was usually pinched and her wails pierced the household on most occasions. Of course, she was always placated by her daddy. He loved her so.

Kendra grew into a precocious, sassy little nymph, with red corkscrew locks. Our parents indulged her every whim. With them she could be whiny and spoiled. But no so with me. I, as Millie had been to Kathy and Kerry, became her disciplinarian. On many occasions, I was left as her charge. In the beginning she resented my methods but later in childhood she came to love and support me. We forged a bond that cannot be broken by anyone or anything.

She has always been my protector. When she was only four years old, my mom was upset and yelling at me in the family bathroom. Kendra rushed my mom from behind and landed a blow with her tiny fist in mom’s back and exclaimed, “Don’t yell at my Krisy!” She has also stood staunchly behind me even when I was wrong. To her, I believe, I can do no wrong. With her encouragement, I am able to do anything I dream to do. My deepest desire is to be just like her when I grow up.

Kendra is affectionate, devoted, impassioned. As the women before her, she has seen too many tragedies at too early an age. Naming her future heirs when she was just a small child, her dream has always been to hold her own child. Her dream nearly came to fruition but was soon extinguished with the deaths of her three infant sons. If you look very closely you can see an inkling of clouds behind her sparkling eyes. She is determined, however, to dream another dream, live a different life, love a new love and laugh through it all.