Ever since, I've been meaning to do a post on a really nice thing that happened to the Rossi family (and me in particular) one Christmas morning.
It was Christmas Day 1986 - I was in the Upper 6th at school - and I'd just completed my set of mock A'Level exams in anticipation of the real ones coming up that summer. I think I failed most of them but that's not relevant to the story!
We'd just got back from Mass and were in the process of preparing for our 'at home' party which we had always had on Christmas morning - half the parish would call round after each of the morning Masses and have a little Chrimbly tipple, some panettone, mince pies, and all the lovely nibbles of the season.
It wasn't time for any of the guests to arrive yet, but the doorbell rang and I ran off to answer it. As I did, a car which looked as though it was waiting until someone opened the door, moved off and drove away down the street. How weird. I thought it was someone hand-delivering a card - but you'd have thought they'd put their head round the door to say hello, seeing as it was Christmas morning!
I looked down and there was a plastic carrier bag on the doorstep. Weirder still! I picked it up and brought it into the dining room. Mum, Dad, Janey and Uncle Jim were there. I told them what had happened and we all started to get a bit nervous. Was it a bomb? Who would leave a bag of stuff, anonymously, on someone's doorstep, on Christmas morning? Curiouser & curiouser, as Alice would say.
Inside the bag were a number of little parcels wrapped in Christmas wrapping paper.
Eventually, we plucked up the courage to open the first one and found a toy, suitable for a little girl, aged about 5 or 6 years old. What was going on? We opened the next one, another toy, again suitable for a tiny child. A children's book, a puzzle, a teddy. This was very strange indeed.
Eventually we got to the bottom of the bag, and opened the last parcel. Inside, beautifully shrouded in coloured tissue paper, was my favourite, and oldest cuddly toy. A little pig, called 'Piggy' (good job I went into the sciences, rather than the arts!) who I'd had since the day I was born.
Piggy is a MUCH LOVED toy, whose hands and feet I chewed on as an infant, and so my Nonna sewed him a little yellow jumper and orange shoes, to keep his stuffing in. He once was pink, and fluffy, but over the years he's gone a bit grey, and bald! You just can see how much he's been hugged!!!!
So, how come he ended up in a bag of toys on our doorstep on Christmas morning?
Well, as mentioned at the top of this blog, It was exam time, and as well as being my oldest toy, he was my lucky mascot during exams and has sat on the exam table with me for every test I've ever taken! Fortunately, Mum made me stick an address lable to his shoe when I took him out of the house.
So.....all we can speculate is that I must have dropped him somewhere, and someone lovely found him, on the bus or in the street, and pictured the little girl who was going to be missing this well loved toy. They must have planned to deliver her a lovely surprise on Christmas morning by returning Piggy and a whole load of other toys, suitable for the owner of this little pig. Little did they know that the little girl was not so little - 18 years old and sitting her A'Levels!
It really made our Christmas Day, we thought it was WONDERFUL. Proper Christmas spirit. And we kept imagining the family who must have been enjoying their Christmas day because they'd done a good deed to a little girl who had lost her favourite toy!
Needless to say the toys which I was given, went to a deserving cause, and Piggy has been kept safe with me, sat on the bed, for the last 22 years!
He's getting on a bit now (a bit like his owner, he he) and Auntie Bo has recently done him a refurb, so he's all bright and shiny again - although he is still a bit grey and balding! It doesn't matter, i'll always love him!
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