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SUSAN HELLARDFrom Christmas past to Christmas present, the greatest gifts are never forgotten
He may be checking his list twice, but have you? Never mind Black Friday, Cyber Monday and all the rest, we could all do with taking a long, hard look at what’s in our seasonal shopping baskets.
I’m as bad as anyone (“OMG it’s two-for-one!”
I say, grabbing the novelty bubblebath). But many years ago I was taught a very important lesson.
I was about five years old and I’d been taken to visit my great aunts, who were twins in their nineties. It was a heavenly summer day and great aunt Enid sat next to me on the garden bench, grasping a glorious collection of blooms from their carefully tended flowerbeds. She was a very elegant old lady, her long, grey hair in a loose bun with falling tendrils that framed her face (I often imagined she’d been a ballerina; she certainly had the bone structure and poise of a lady who once pirouetted en pointe).
It was very hot and although I was the sort of little girl who’d normally be climbing trees or paddling in streams, that day I just sat with my aunt (“seen and not heard” was the rule) and felt incredibly special to have her attention. Aunt Ethel, her twin, normally dominated our visits. She was smaller, stouter, very rambunctious, and aunt Enid would simply smile and waft in and out with tea and cakes while her sister held court. But today was different.
Aunt Enid and I just sat there, looking out over the garden to the fields beyond and the cows grazing lazily in the heat, until I glanced sideways and realised she was watching me, smiling.
“It’s very beautiful, isn’t it?” she said.
I smiled back at her and nodded. Then her slim arm pulled me close as she asked, “Of all the flowers in the garden, which is your favourite?”
I considered my answer carefully. After all, there were hundreds to choose from. But there was one plant that I’d never seen before, that seemed to be twice my height and exploding with flowers in many different shades of pink.
“That one,” I said. “It’s really pretty. And daisies, of course. I really love daisies.”
“Daisies are a wonderful gift to us all. They arrive without invitation and ask us to play.”
She chuckled and gave me a gentle squeeze. “Mischievous and adorable, just like you.”
Normally when visiting my aunts, I was never quite sure whether I was behaving properly or doing the right thing. But when she said those words, I felt overwhelmed with happiness and love.
“Those other flowers are hollyhocks,” said Enid. “They’re very wonderful. My favourites too.”
Our little chat was ended by the arrival of Aunt Ethel with glasses of home-made lemonade, and then it was time to leave.
That Christmas, one present under the tree was wrapped differently from all the others.
It was covered in thick white paper with hand-drawn flowers and tied with a yellow silk ribbon.
On Christmas morning I opened it carefully, and inside was a strange and wonderful contraption made of wood, with screws on the corners and a little home-made book.
Inside were pressed flowers in a beautiful pattern – daisies and hollyhocks. There was also a little packet of seeds, and on it was written:
“I shall be the hollyhock and you the daisy, and we will smile at the sun together. With so much love, your adoring Aunt E.”
I planted those seeds, and from that day to this I have always had hollyhocks and daisies wherever I’ve lived. I have also known that the presents that cost the least so often last the longest.
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