The Best Gift

When I was a kid, I was obsessed with Strawberry Shortcake dolls. I’d save up my weekly allowance, and when I had enough saved, my mom would take me to the local toy store, where I would buy one of the dolls. The dolls had cute names like Strawberry Shortcake, Apple Dumpling (a baby), Blueberry Muffin, and Huckleberry Pie. On top of being adorable, they were scented, and they smelled heavenly. Then, there was the Strawberry Shortcake bakery, a must-have for any serious collector; it came with a little oven, some fake pies, some garden utensils, and plastic strawberries, among other things. But there was one small problem with the bakery: it would have taken me about forty years to save up for it, so I did what most kids do when they want—no, need—a high-priced toy; I asked Santa.

Santa came through, and I got the bakery. It was my version of the Red Rider, and I loved it, so when my mom’s cancer got bad enough to warrant hospice care, it, along with all my other beloved toys, came with me to live at my dad’s house. Not long after, my mom lost her battle with cancer.

Eventually, I outgrew playing with toys, but occasionally, I would pull them out of my closet to touch and look at them. I’d smell the Strawberry Shortcake dolls, close my eyes, and my mind would return to a happier time. I planned to keep them all forever because they came from my mom, but one day, when I came home from school and went to the closet to get them, they were gone. I tore the closet apart, but they were nowhere to be found. They had vanished.

When I asked my sister about them, she said she had given them to a friend of a friend’s child. She meant well, and her heart was in the right place. Knowing that I didn’t play with toys anymore and because the little girl she’d given them to didn’t have many toys, my sister didn’t think it would matter to me if she gave them away. Indeed, it wouldn’t have mattered if the toys didn’t have so much sentimental value, but they did, and I was heartbroken. Even though I’ve told her I forgive her, to this day, she still feels terrible about it–so much so that it seems she told others about it. A few weeks ago, she called and asked if I was home because she and her granddaughter wanted to stop by so her granddaughter could give me something she’d bought me earlier that day.

I almost cried when that sweet girl handed me a stuffed Strawberry Shortcake doll. For reasons similar to mine, she feels an attachment to some of her toys/things, so she understood why I had been so devastated back then. She wanted to make it better—and she did.

I think we all have stuff we hold on to—physical things that we treasure, not because they hold any monetary value, but because they make us feel connected to the people we love who are no longer with us. Yet, as much as I treasured that Strawberry Shortcake Bakery, it can’t compare to the stuffed doll whose purpose was to heal a part of me that had been broken for so many years. Just like it wasn’t about the toys, it wasn’t the doll itself that succeeded in its purpose; it was the loving and kind gesture of the person who gave it to me.

Sometimes, a gift—in this case, the gift of healing—shows up when you least expect it and is given by someone you’d never expect it from.

And that kind of gift, well…that’s the best gift.