UNWANTED GIFTS

Perhaps it’s the time of year, perhaps it’s the endless rolls of wrapping paper and ribbon that are blocking the aisles at the stores, or perhaps it’s just because I’m greedy and I like to get things. Whatever the inspiration, gifts have been on the brain a lot the past few weeks. Presents and wishes that I had hoped to receive, the perfect, personalized item to give to the people who dare to put up with me on a regular basis, even the original Christmas gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh have caught my attention.

We tend to get consumed by the excitement and anticipation of giving and receiving as soon as December 1st pops on our calendars. Which is a wonderful feeling! Nothing can compare to the look on someone’s face when you’ve managed to secure the gift that seems as if it could only have been ever made for them, or vice versa. Sharing our time, talents, love, and gifts are such incredible ways to emulate the Savior, and I am always grateful for the opportunity when it rolls around.

However, would this even be Confessions of a Negative (N)ellie if we did not look on the other side of the coin? Let ourselves roll around in the muck and the mud of pessimism?

Unwanted gifts. We’ve all gotten them. A sweater that is a few sizes to big, or not our color by any stretch of the imagination. (Hello! Pale as they come here. Mustard yellow will never be my color.) Socks, underwear, a set of pots and pans, practical things that we need but do not want. Or, perhaps as a young boy, you receive the speakers for an X-Box, while your older sister, who had no idea what an X-Box was at the time, receives the actual gaming console you had begged for. You know, hypothetical situations.

(I did end up sharing my gift with him, so he can’t be too mad, right? I mean, he wouldn’t still be bitter about that twenty plus years later.)

Sometimes, you just don’t get what you want come Christmas morning, and that can be a hard pill to swallow. However, do you know what will choke you even more? Two years of unwanted gifts. Thatttsssss right. While others (my mother) dance around the house signing Christmas carols and filling the world with cheer, her favorite mooch can be found sitting on the couch, stewing about all the things she didn’t want, but somehow still received.

My list of grievances stretches around the world at least two times over, and guess what? I’m here to share a few with you. That’s right. In the true spirit of the season, I am going to go down the list of the gifts I was given over the past two years that I neither begged nor asked for.

I did not want to move. Leaving my hometown, the people and the places I loved, I was sure would leave a forever hole in my heart. And, I can’t lie and say that said organ still doesn’t ache for the promised land just forty-five minutes away, but somehow here has become home, too. Here is where I started chasing my dreams. Here is where my family became my best friends. Here is where new people and places managed to find some room in my cold, black heart.

I did not want to be called to into Primary, you know, because children and I have have never exactly seen eye to eye. However, there is something magic about the children in this town In the desert. They are some of the sweetest, tenderest souls I have ever met, and are truly gifts from Heavenly Father Himself. Not once have they failed to make me smile, and laugh until I cry, even on the worst of days.

I did not want to get another dog. We all know this. The entire world knows this. I was not exactly quiet about my feelings. This gremlin posing as a puppy truly made me question abandoning my comfortable life as everyone’s favorite mooch. Cleaning up various forms of bodily functions, races to the death up the stairs, and just this morning, sewing the harness she had managed to chew through whilst wearing it. This is a gift no one would ever want. Though, I must admit, there is nothing quite like seeing her run towards me, her body shaking with excitement, every morning. I never knew I needed a bathroom buddy, a permanent shadow, or a best friend.

I did not want to interact with anyone at the store two weeks ago. After a long day dealing with said gremlin, and a multiple hour shopping trip ahead of me, I was more than ready to tune out the world. Headphones in hand, I wanted nothing but to ignore the prompting to leave them at home. Then, half an hour later, grumbling to myself about my own foolishness for not accompanying my trip with proper amounts of angsty music, two of my favorite people in the world appeared around the corner of an aisle. Not knowing the day I had walked through, they fed me the words and comforts I was desperate to hear. I needed to hear.

I did not want to go to church alone this past Sunday. In fact, quite exhausted from a busy week, and with a sick dog at home, the thing I most wanted to do was park myself on the couch in my holiday jammies, a pint of ice cream in hand. Taking up a whole pew by myself, I tried to hold my head high, squinting beneath the neon sign that let all know I was A-L-O-N-E. Then, out of nowhere, an angel dressed in candy cane stripes came to sit beside me. And then her sister came. And then her brother. Soon, not only was my pew filled to capacity with irreverent laughter and lots of warmth, but so was my heart.

I did not want to lose my grandfather this year. The biggest supporter of my hopes and aspirations, one of the few people on this earth who considered me to be one of their favorites, how could I possibly make it through without him? It didn’t seem possible. But then it did. Seated in the chair that could and would only ever be his, I sat beside my grandmother for almost two full months. Binging tv shows, living on ice cream and laughter, we somehow made it through. Together. He brought us together in a way I doubt would ever have been possible without his goodbye, and though I miss him dearly, I am so thankful he left me his sweetheart.

Ok, is it just me, or did that have a lot less negativity in it than expected? Where are the gray clouds? Where are the injustices? Where are the unwanted gifts?

They are there. Oh boy, can I assure you of that, and so can He. Many of my prayers these past two years were not exactly of the gracious and humble quality. Lots of tears. Lots of silent treatment. Lots of “Why me?”’s. So, then, how are these outcomes possible? How could Miss Cranky McCrank, with her anger and her spite and armfuls of unwanted gifts have ever penned that?

Jesus Christ. As always, He is the answer to all.

It never ceases to amaze me, the miracles the Savior of the World works in our lives. In the moments where life can seem so hard, so draining, so hopeless, the sunlight of His love comes shining through in just the right moment. Reminding us not only of His immense love, and the incredible plan He has created specifically for each of us, but that we were never, ever alone.

There were times where I truly thought these unwanted gifts had been bestowed upon me by an angry, unloving God, one who had no hand in my life, and at the least, very little care. If that was untrue, if He loved me as much as my parents, the scriptures, the prophets, and the whisperings of my own heart told me, then why this? Why give me these things that brought me so much sorrow? And anger, let’s be real.

Because He does love me. Isn’t that so evident in these unwanted gifts? Each moment, each mess, each time I believed I was being punished, He awarded me with something so tender, so pure, so undeniably loving, I couldn’t help but know He was there. Through it all, He had never left me, but rather, was orchestrating it all to bring me the best.

That’s right. Somehow, in the midst of all my whining and complaining, despite it all, in fact, He turned my unwanted into wanted. To beloved, to treasured, to things I’d never dream of parting with. Throughout the past two years, I’ve often believed He was set on giving me the opposite of everything I thought I needed. When, throughout it all, not just during this wonderful time of year, He’d been giving me more than I could have ever imagined.

For seven hundred and thirty days, He’s scoured the earth for the perfect gifts that were made just for me. A kind word, a new relationship, (platonic. come on now. that miracle is gonna take a whole lot more work.) or hope that is so all encompassing it makes me want to sing. I mean, I guess I had to show some sort of relation to my mom.

That, is what the Savior of the World does. Year round, He turns the unwanted to the wanted, the messes to miracles, and the awful to the awe-inspiring. He is always there, in every detail of His specific plan for us, we just have to look for Him.

So, as you receive your many wants this Christmas season, or perhaps that unwanted gift from someone who is less in-touch then others, (it’s me, I’m out of touch) or even the hardest of times, never forget the giver of the best of gifts, Jesus Christ. The greatest gift the world has ever known, He refuses to stop there. Taking a personal interest in each and every one of our lives, He uses the pains and struggles He suffered through with us to guide us to the very happiest parts of life. Sometimes, that means passing through things that seem unfair, unnecessary, and unwanted. Do not despair, dear reader. I can promise you that no gift from God is an unwanted one.