Then I write a Christmas card, with a photocopy of the tag inserted, to each adult. The card goes under the tree, so on Christmas morning they know I was thinking of them and that a child is opening a gift provided in their honor.
It was my dad and I who started this. My first card to him read something like this “Dad, you did a really good job providing for us four kids all these years. I never went without anything I needed and received an appropriate amount of what I wanted. I never once in my childhood doubted that there would be presents under the tree. My gift to you this Christmas is to give a little bit of that security to another child. Picture in your mind’s eye the expression on this 4-year-old boy’s face as he opens a box and finds the Lego set he wanted. Merry Christmas.”
My dad died last January. I have chosen a tag and bought a gift for a boy in honor of his memory.
