Promise Kept

No, I answered, I didn't have my own Nativity set.

"You find one you love, Sissy, and I'll buy it for you," Nannie said, and apologized once more for the pet name because I was grown with my own family. But I loved my grandmother dearly and she could call me whatever she wanted.

Season after season I searched for just the right creche. After so much time had gone by I figured she had forgotten, till one day she asked me again. No, I told her, I still hadn't found the perfect Baby Jesus scene.

"When you find one, let me know," she said. "I want it to be a gift from me."

Nannie passed away before I ever found the ideal Mary and Joseph figurines.

Every holiday season after she died, it felt bittersweet to put up my Christmas tree and remember that she had wanted to give me my own infant Savior in a manger.

Year after year, box by box, my mother and uncle sorted through Nannie's belongings. Being the only granddaughter and having the largest family, I was often given first choice. Did I want Nannie's Tupperware? Her china with the tiny pink roses? Her silverware set?

Did I want Nannie's holiday decorations? The rest of the family couldn't use them. Some had too small of a house. Others didn't celebrate Christmas. They were all mine if I wished.

There were two snow globes, each a different artistic interpretaion of the Holy Family. One tiny pewter Madonna and her betrothed, with her newborn in the hay. A palm-sized porcelain shed containing the Child and the parents. And there was Nannie's ceramic Nativity with the little wooden barn. Every piece was there, including the shepherds and their sheep, the Magi and their camels. The donkey, a cow, and an angel with outstretched arms. Five Nativity scenes in all, and just what I would have chosen.