This little angel is 52 years old. I believe that makes her a homemade antique. My Grandmother made her. My parents first Christmas together, my Mother lamented that she had no angel for the tree. Grandma took a wrapping paper tube, pretty blue fabric, a styrofoam ball, sequins, and sparkly rick rack. She whipped her up and glued some doll hair to her head. Back in the day, for my Family anyway, it was customary for the Christmas Tree to appear on Christmas Morning which meant that the couple, or parents put up the Tree on Christmas Eve. After I was born, this was how it was for maybe 5 years. Santa brought the Tree. My Mother's need for the Angel would have arrived on Christmas Eve, 1959. The Angel remained as our Family tree topper for all of the years of my childhood, and teenage-dom. For me, she is a symbol of young love (my Mother was 18 years old when she married) and naivety . I like to remember and think of my parents together during this time. He had not yet scared the hell out of her, and she did not yet feel trapped by circumstance, ignorance and children. This little Angel, she has see a lot of happiness and grief during her 52 years. There are a string of years where, if she wondered, her thought would have been, "why have I been forgotten?" a thought I can relate to along with my Mother, Brother and Sister. I love this Angel. She is a symbol of my life and Family and probably the only item I would choose to have cremated with me. I begin this new year of 2012 with much reflection and will continue these thoughts here. My Mother was diagnosed with terminal lung cancer 2 weeks before Christmas 2011. There are many things I wish I could change for her, for the better in her history. Many ways I wish our stories had been different... but then..we would not be who we are today without our stories as they are. For better, for worse, it is what it is.
