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The gifts that stay with us forever

Sorting through the fads and conviences to find out what makes a gift memorable.

Cabbage Patch dolls, Pound Puppies, Tickle Me Elmo, Hot Wheels. Nintendo, X-Box and hundreds of other must-have toys have come and gone into the foggy recesses of Christmases Past.

We’re knees deep into that season again and I am ignorant of what tops every child’s Christmas List this year, having not ventured into a toy department this year, nor having read a single Santa Letter yet.

I remember at one point of my own childhood pouring over the Sears Christmas catalogue and making up my “Christmas List”, which seemed almost as big as the catalogue. But I can’t remember one thing I put on that list.

What I do remember is that I never received anything on that list.

There are a few gifts that stand out in my memory from over the years, and none of them came from a catalogue. One was a second-hand saxaphone my parents found for me at a garage sale; the other was a pair of adorable kittens that my partner, Tool Man, found in a barn in Falkland.

While there are no “bad” gifts - because it’s the thought that counts, right? - a gift that you can always remember is very special indeed.

I realize that my favourite gifts aren’t contributing to the economy (unless you count how much those “adorable” little kitties eat!), but it can’t always be about “the economy”. How about what makes us happy?

Here’s wishing you all a happy and memorable Christmas.

Wendy Coomber is the editor of the Ashcroft-Cache Creek Journal