Listen to the MUSN’TS, child,
Listen to the DON’TS
Listen to the SHOULDN’TS
The IMPOSSIBLES, the WON’TS
Listen to the NEVER HAVES
Then listen close to me –
Anything can happen, child,
ANYTHING can be.

Shel Silverstein (1932 – 1999)

When I asked my co-worker Dave what his seven-year-old daughter wanted for Christmas he shrugged his shoulders and said, “Nothing really.”

Nothing?

Really? 

At what point in the past forty years did seven-year-old girls decide they no longer wanted ponies for Christmas? From the time I was five years old until I was—oh—thirty-eight, I dreamed of having a pony show up on the morning of December 25th. Every year on Christmas I’d wake up, get out of bed and take a peak out the window, sure I would see a magnificent steed standing in our backyard. I imagined my pony would look exactly like the one printed on page thirty-seven of my Album of Horses book, right down to the white blaze that ran down the middle of his head.

And this dream was not mine alone. Every third grade girl in Mr. Turnbell’s class at Creslane elementary school wanted a pony for Christmas. I know this because our final class assignment before we left on Christmas break was to write an essay about a gift we hoped to receive. Every essay written by every girl in the class started out exactly the same: “I hope I get a pony this year for Christmas.” A less experienced teacher, one not familiar with the universal yearning all elementary school aged girls had for horses, might have suspected a serious case of plagiarism.

Sure, there were some differences amongst all of us. Some girls in my class wanted a Welsh pony. Others hoped for one of the Shetland variety. None of us knew exactly what the differences between the two really were and I’m pretty sure none of us would have turned down a pony of a different kind had one actually shown up at our house.

Mind you I never knew anyone, classmate or otherwise, who ever got a pony for Christmas. Or for their birthday. Or for Thanksgiving, Easter, Memorial Day or Halloween. And in looking back, it’s probably for the best. If the parents of all fifty million horse-crazy girls in the world had all decided to simultaneously fulfill the wishes of their daughters there probably would have been some pretty serious supply-and-demand issues to deal with.

And for the record, I never felt neglected, abused or otherwise mistreated because I never got a pony. Quite the opposite really. You see, I never once stopped hoping for a pony. Hope is what drove my childhood passion—dare I say obsession—with horses. And things like hope and passion are lifelong gifts.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to go. You see, I asked Eric for a puppy for Christmas and ANYTHING can be…

 © 2009 Kristine A. Gunter