Faith in Christmas spirit restored

Though I admit it, the magic of Christmas has faded for me over the years. This year, people I may never meet restored the magic of Christmas for me.

Like most children, I could barely contain myself as the days drew closer and closer to Christmas. I scoured the TV guide to see when “Santa Is Comin’ To Town,” “Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer” and the other old 1950s stop-motion Christmas specials would be on. (I skipped the animated “Frosty” shows. Those kids with the monstrous rat-like teeth creeped me out.) I decorated my bedroom window with Christmas lights. I helped my mother decorate the tree.

When they introduced the fake-snow-in-a-can, I would cover almost every window in the house until my mother told me ease back a little. On Christmas Eve I absolutely would not, could not sleep. I would stay up until the wee hours helping my mother wrap my stepbrothers’ gifts (they were always at their mother’s house and didn’t come over until Christmas afternoon.)

Eventually, I would pass out and she would wrap the rest of the presents and put them under the tree. When Christmas morning came, I would tear down the stairs to see the piles of presents. Our tradition was that I got to open one gift, then wait for my stepbrothers to arrive to open the rest together. Back then, mom and my step-dad were doing pretty well with the various family businesses and I don’t mind saying we were a bit spoiled.

The years went by and I was a single guy living by myself in Alaska. Christmases then became days spent with friends four-wheeling off Hiland Road, sledding at Arctic Valley or going to Christmas parties. We would all get each other a few gifts, never expecting a lot since we were all poor. And besides, the fun came from hanging out and just being together. Christmas was a blast.

Somewhere around age 21, I was transferred back to Washington state. My old friends were long gone, the family businesses had slipped quite a bit, my siblings were always in some state of squabbling and I felt very, very alone. I distinctly recall those Christmases spent sitting by myself in my little rental with no tree, no cards, no gifts and no Christmas. It was the first time I grasped what “Christmas depression” was. It wasn’t the lack of gifts that got me down, it was the lack of friends and family.

“What’s this?” I thought. “Is this it? Is this what being an adult is? You lose all that wonderful Christmas excitement?” The idea was awful.

Then I got married and started having children. And Christmas was back! The joy of watching children feel the same excitement I had experienced growing up, knowing and understanding how they felt brought it all back. In fact, I think it was even better. Making my children happy and instilling that Christmas magic in them remains one of my absolute favorite parts of parenthood.

In more recent years, for no discernible rhyme or reason, tragedy or hardship seems to strike at Christmastime. People robbing us, something extremely expensive, or some catastrophic health issue — you name it — it’s nailed us. This produced an unconscious sense of dread in me around the holidays. Oh sure, I tried to fight it, but when it happened for a few years in a row I couldn’t shake it. Which brings me to this year.

This was the “year of the car.” A few months ago we suffered through some car problems and got knocked down to one car (my old Jeep that was never meant to be more than a back up rig.) To help with the car shortage, our good friend Jamie loaned us her Ford Expedition that she never uses.

Expensive as heck to operate but hey, you do what you gotta do, right? And it was a good thing she loaned to us because one day, as Glenny was driving the kids to school, the shift-lever came completely off in her hand as she was shifting. A quick welding job and we had it fixed.

Then in the span of a few weeks, the Expedition lost half the wiring harness and the gas cap broke in half. Two of the tires went flat on the Jeep. The Expedition threw a rod — immediately after Glenny filled the gas tank. The Jeep refused to start at minus 20, even with its block-heater on. The Jeep’s battery gave up the ghost and the battery terminals came loose where the wire meets the clamp (oh the joy of fixing that in 80 mph gusts, in the dark, while your friend is waiting down the road in a snowberm for you to come pull her out).

Then Jamie, who is also my carpool friend, blew a radiator hose as we were trying to get home from Anchorage. We nearly froze to death sitting on the top of the Arctic Valley exit ramp waiting for the tow truck. The shift lever on the Expedition came off in Glenny’s hand again (went in for welding job No. 2) and finally, last week, Jamie and I were rear-ended in Anchorage as we were coming home.

Glenny and I could only watch as our Christmas money, and finally the money we needed to pay bills, went to towing costs, car parts and repairs.

Last week when I had the misfortune of crossing paths with a handful of young mothers complaining that the donated Christmas gifts they received weren’t “as good as the ones they got last year” or “they didn’t get my son the iPod he wanted.” I honestly didn’t get upset. I didn’t get angry. I just felt broken. I walked out of the store with my hands tucked into my coat pockets, looking down at my boots feeling lost and totally hollow inside.

And that’s when it all sort of happened at once. Within 30 seconds of posting something on my Facebook about how silly it was that all these things were happening, a friend and former co-worker sent me a message saying, “We have a truck you can borrow for a few weeks.”

Then Glenny got word that somebody we don’t even know had paid our MEA bill. Other people we don’t know heard through the grapevine about the kind of luck the Comptons were having and we received some wonderful anonymous gifts for the children and a gift card for Safeway. I was stunned. We weren’t asking for help, we weren’t expecting any. It just arrived out of nowhere.

To say I am touched by this kindness doesn’t even come close. I try not to be a prideful man. I don’t want to be the guy with his hand out. I have always worked and earned everything I have. But mixed up with this sense of responsibility to provide for my own family is an overwhelming sense of appreciation and gratitude for this Christmas miracle. “Christmas miracle” may seem cheesy, but I do believe in miracles.

To be clear, it’s not the fact that we received such things that I consider a joyous miracle. What is miraculous to me is that at the moment I was teetering on the edge of giving up my cherished love of Christmas and the way it reminds me that people are inherently “good,” people who I may never know delivered this impeccably-timed reminder to never lose faith, never doubt.

Whoever these people are, I hope they are reading this. “Thank you” doesn’t begin to express my gratitude, but I hope it will suffice until I can repay this gift the best way I know how, by passing on to others to cherish Christmas as a reminder of the good that is inherent in all of us.

Ben Compton is a Palmer resident and publishes his column as “Compton’s Corner,” the same title used by his grandmother, Phyllis Compton, a longtime Frontiersman columnist.