Christmas Blues

    My mother was not a particularly fastidious person, but she was very particular about what kind of food she and her kids put in their mouths.  We were taught not to eat food that another child may have offered, and, stressed most of all, we were not to share food with anyone, no licking another person's ice cream cone, for example, or drinking anyone's else's soda.  That being said...
    Christmas was a welcome and cherished holiday, but not for the wealth of toys being received.  When we were little, I think we received one toy-type present, and a few clothes and little treats.  We never felt left out, because no children we knew received anywhere near the plethora of toys that  today's kids get.  One year,when I was probably six or seven years old, my main Christmas present was a toy doctor's kit.  It was a fairly sturdy heavy cardboard kit, brown, with a clasp closure, silver colored.  Inside the doctor's kit was a miniature stethoscope, a reflex hammer, one of those eye-thingies which we used to imagine doctors employed, some tongue depressors, a simulated hypodermic needle, some prescription pads, and most amazing of all, two little packs of candy  pills, formulated of blue tic-tac like dosages.  Back in the day, we kids, or at least I, liked to make our things last, whether we were eating dessert, or holding on to our toys.  So I didn't want to ruin the perfection of my doctor's kit by disturbing any of its elements.  I wanted to maintain its pristine condition.  Unable to completely resist though, I finally put one of the little blue pills in my mouth, sucked its sweetness for a short time, thought better of it, and put the pill back in its little cardboard packet.  Later that day, my mother was looking at our toys, including of course, my doctor's kit.  "Oh, let me try a candy pill," she said, and then, "I"ll try this little light blue one."   I felt my stomach drop; I wanted to yell----"No, not that one! Don't eat the light blue one!"   But I was too stunned, and too ashamed of what I had done to say anything at all.  I knew it was not a good thing to half-eat something and then put it back.  So I stayed quiet, and waited in fear and dread for my mother to get sick from eating leftover, second-hand food.  I knew I was being a coward, but I couldn't help it.  I was mute.  My mother didn't get sick that night or the next day, or the next, so gradually I came to accept that my bad manners, fear and cowardice hadn't killed my mother.  The shame remained though and not until this moment have I confessed a single word.  I don't know why the mind retains bits like this: even now I feel a little embarrassed by the memory.  (And I don't think I ever ate any more of those pills.)