Description: The writer recalls a Christmas morning as a young boy on a farm when Santa did not bring the real gift.
Excerpt: It only looked like a normal Christmas Eve. We were all pretending in order not to upset anyone else, so to a remote observer, everything would have appeared to be fine. The funny thing is, I think all three of us knew the others were pretending too. Jerry and I were twins, had always had the kind of connection to let us know what the other felt. When we were toddlers, we had had our own language as many twins do. But that was forgotten as we learned English to be able to speak with our parents. The empathy didn’t disappear though, so even though we were six and our unique language long gone, we knew how each other felt. Mom too. She was that kind of mother. It’s kind of sad that that ability to sense what others are feeling disappears in boys as they age. Maybe it doesn’t in this generation, but it did for those of born in 1947 when cells were in jails, not purses or pockets.