A 2000 Christmas letter to Grandma ~ December 21, 2000

David Heiller

Dear Grandma:

Christmas is here already, so I’ll give you my annual update and send it with Gabriel.

We are burning a lot of propane, Grandma. It’s been a cold January, and we are still in December. Snow too! A real winter, after three of the pretend variety.

We have a lot of birds at the feeders. We even had a starling the other day, a big galoot that had Noah asking, “Should I get the .22, Dad?” He still remembers how you hated starlings. Either that or it’s in his genes.

Noah was a bit older than this in 2000,
 but the idea is the same.

I put the kibosh on that. If I spread the table with food, then all the guests should be welcome. You would take exceptions with the starlings, if memory serves me right.

Mollie is going to sing at Church on Christmas Eve. That will make the service even more special, and it’s always special, the candlelight service, going way back to Brownsville with you by my side.

It feels like Christmas, and that can be both good and bad. I hope that’s not blasphemy. Christmas is never a smooth time for me. It’s a roller-coaster of joy and tension. Sometimes I feel like George Bailey. I want to kick over the presents and throw a book at the wisemen.

It can create some difficult moments between Cindy and me. We can clash over Christmas. It happened on Saturday. I’ll spare you the details. But we worked it out.

We always seem to break out of the fog of getting ready for Christmas. The decorations get put up. Cindy gets the house looking beautiful, full of lights and garlands and angles and can­dles, and I wonder how I ever could have objected to any of it. The presents get bought and wrapped. Company comes, and children. The wall fills up with cards from friends and relatives.

It’s a time of wonder, and a time of being thankful.

Kids wonder about the Santa guy. Adults wonder about this Jesus baby.

Husbands are thankful for their wives, for their wisdom and patience and skill and beauty. And vice versa.

We count our blessings this time of year too. I was talking to Don Benrud after church on Sunday. He had a bad illness this year. He almost died. He lost his hearing in one ear from it, and now has to live with a constant buzz in that ear, and problems with his equilibrium. But he told me with a smile that he really doesn’t have it bad at all. It’s nothing compared to what some people have to deal with. I could see that he meant it. He was counting his blessings, and it gave me courage to see his courage.

David with his Grandma Schnick and his sister, Lynette.
 He always missed them both.

One of my great blessings was having you for a grandma. You’ve been gone for 11 years now. But you are still alive in my heart, and I know you always will be.

How many kids are lucky enough to have their grandma live upstairs? That was the greatest gift of all. You were like a lantern in the window, always there with cribbage board and longhorn colby cheese. Always brimming with stories about the good old days. Yes, the time you got an orange for Christmas, when you were a little girl in Nebraska, and how sweet and good that orange tasted! Always full of love.

So it’s another Christmas, Grandma, another good one. Thanks for listening. You are still a part of it.

Love, David