Sample “From Santa's Secret Workshop With Love” In the garage while rummaging through the assorted fragments of my life that have collected everywhere — sets of dirty spark plugs for the cars long gone, rusted keys to forgotten doors of houses lost in divorce, parts of things that can never be repaired — in my frantic quest to find something or other, although I can't remember now exactly what it was, though it must have been something absolutely essential to my existence right there and then, I came across the little plastic toolbox in the shape of a suitcase no bigger than a pack of cigarettes. The case was scratched and dirty, with the paper travel stickers at the corners peeled away and faded now from the years. It was a forgotten present you had given me, but seeing it there so many years later in the bottom of the drawer, I realized that I hadn't forgotten it at all. Seeing it there unleashed a montage of memories that played through my mind like a film clip, stretching back twenty-five years to Christmas 1976, when you were just a little boy and I was still too full of myself to be much of a father. By then the divorce had lost some of its sting, at least for me, and the pain of our separation, yours and mine, although not completely gone, had become something both of us had learned to live with. Still, whenever I dropped you home after a visit, your little face pressed against the window was the last thing that I saw when I pulled away from the curb. And the times we were together the signs of your adoration were obvious and everywhere. You couldn't get enough of me. You put your toothbrush next to mine, sat so close whenever we watched TV the warmth of your body pressed against me melted into mine. Like a puppy you followed me at every chance, and never let me out of your sight. Perhaps you were afraid that I was going to leave you – again. Every time I turned around you were there watching, waiting, outside the bathroom door, in the basement workshop, poking your head under another old ’51 Merc out in the garage while I changed the oil or bruised my hands on the rusted exhaust. From the corner of my eye I watched you when you didn’t see me watching, and I listened to the games you played. You always cast me in the role of hero. “Call me Joe,” you told me. You wanted to be me. And though I knew the truth, how unworthy I was of that honor you bestowed on me, it filled me with deep satisfaction. "Merry Christmas," you said the day you handed me the present that your mother helped you wrap. "It's a tool kit for your car," you couldn't resist telling me even before I was able to open it. “From Santa's Secret Workshop. And I bought it myself. With my own money," you told me with the flash of pride in your young, dark eyes. Taking that little plastic box out of the drawer and holding it in my hand brought everything back in a clarity that only time can provide. I forgot what I was looking for, the thing that seemed so important at the time and I went inside the house. Even though I knew you were at work I dialed your number. "Thank you," I said to the machine when I heard your voice at the other end, so far away in Florida, "for that Christmas gift you gave me, the toolbox from Santa's Secret Workshop. I also want to thank you for the other gift, one you may not even know you've given me, and that is you. I love you, Ian, for the boy that you were, and for the man you have become. Thank you for being my son and for your love." I remembered the words of the old Harry Chapin song that you always liked to sing, "Cat's in the Cradle,” and I paraphrased them into the receiver, "I wanna be just like you, son. You know I wanna be like you." © 2008 Joseph E. Scalia from Brooklyn Family Scenes (Back)

Sample

“From Santa's Secret Workshop With Love”

In the garage while rummaging through the assorted fragments of my life that have collected everywhere — sets of dirty spark plugs for the cars long gone, rusted keys to forgotten doors of houses lost in divorce, parts of things that can never be repaired — in my frantic quest to find something or other, although I can't remember now exactly what it was, though it must have been something absolutely essential to my existence right there and then, I came across the little plastic toolbox in the shape of a suitcase no bigger than a pack of cigarettes. The case was scratched and dirty, with the paper travel stickers at the corners peeled away and faded now from the years. It was a forgotten present you had given me, but seeing it there so many years later in the bottom of the drawer, I realized that I hadn't forgotten it at all.

Seeing it there unleashed a montage of memories that played through my mind like a film clip, stretching back twenty-five years to Christmas 1976, when you were just a little boy and I was still too full of myself to be much of a father. By then the divorce had lost some of its sting, at least for me, and the pain of our separation, yours and mine, although not completely gone, had become something both of us had learned to live with.

Still, whenever I dropped you home after a visit, your little face pressed against the window was the last thing that I saw when I pulled away from the curb. And the times we were together the signs of your adoration were obvious and everywhere. You couldn't get enough of me. You put your toothbrush next to mine, sat so close whenever we watched TV the warmth of your body pressed against me melted into mine. Like a puppy you followed me at every chance, and never let me out of your sight. Perhaps you were afraid that I was going to leave you – again.

Every time I turned around you were there watching, waiting, outside the bathroom door, in the basement workshop, poking your head under another old ’51 Merc out in the garage while I changed the oil or bruised my hands on the rusted exhaust. From the corner of my eye I watched you when you didn’t see me watching, and I listened to the games you played. You always cast me in the role of hero. “Call me Joe,” you told me. You wanted to be me. And though I knew the truth, how unworthy I was of that honor you bestowed on me, it filled me with deep satisfaction.

"Merry Christmas," you said the day you handed me the present that your mother helped you wrap. "It's a tool kit for your car," you couldn't resist telling me even before I was able to open it. “From Santa's Secret Workshop. And I bought it myself. With my own money," you told me with the flash of pride in your young, dark eyes.

Taking that little plastic box out of the drawer and holding it in my hand brought everything back in a clarity that only time can provide. I forgot what I was looking for, the thing that seemed so important at the time and I went inside the house. Even though I knew you were at work I dialed your number.

"Thank you," I said to the machine when I heard your voice at the other end, so far away in Florida, "for that Christmas gift you gave me, the toolbox from Santa's Secret Workshop. I also want to thank you for the other gift, one you may not even know you've given me, and that is you. I love you, Ian, for the boy that you were, and for the man you have become. Thank you for being my son and for your love."

I remembered the words of the old Harry Chapin song that you always liked to sing, "Cat's in the Cradle,” and I paraphrased them into the receiver, "I wanna be just like you, son. You know I wanna be like you."

(Back)

Brooklyn Family Scenes