“One Christmas morning, after all the gifts had been opened my husband announced that there was one more present in the garage, one that wouldn’t fit under the tree. When it comes to gifts, my husband is both creative and generous, so I don’t even try to guess anymore. I never would have guessed what this present was: a wheelbarrow.

It was perfect.

What I loved so much about the wheelbarrow (besides its sheer utility) is that it required a certain amount of knowing me, knowing my daily life and needs, knowing the pleasure I take in caring for the horses and chickens each day, in order to see its fittingness. Having already had a perfectly usable, if far inferior, wheelbarrow, I certainly didn’t need a new one. And it would have been easier, in both conception and execution, to buy me a necklace or jacket or such. The wheelbarrow was a gift chosen because it was perfect for me.” ~Booked: Literature in the Soul of Me by Karen Swallow Prior.

Today’s Gifts from Semicolon:
A song: Jubilation by Andrew York, guitar by Christopher Parkening.

A birthday: Shirley Jackson, b.1916.
Rosemary Sutcliff, b.1920
Christopher Parkening, b.1947

A verse: Our Brother Is Born by Harry and Eleanor Farjeon

Now every Child that dwells on earth,
Stand up, stand up and sing:
The passing night has given birth
Unto the Children’s King.
Sing sweet as the flute,
Sing clear as the horn,
Sing joy of the Children,
Come Christmas the morn:
Little Christ Jesus
Our brother is born.

Read the rest of the poem, Little Christ Jesus Our Brother Is Born.