Lavinia - The Titus Christmas Angel

My mother’s mother was an angel collector. She passed those angels down to my mother who is also an angel collector. Although there are angel figures everywhere in our house, you never see more than at Christmas time. Some of the Christmas angels are very old, some are pretty new. Even the ones that are fading away are still loved and treasured. My mom decided that it’s time for me to start my own Christmas Angel collection this year, and so in my stocking I found my first angel.

How sweet. Except for one thing…

I noticed something extra special about my angel. Here is her picture, do you notice anything strange?

No? Well here is a closeup...

Still nothing? You’re really not that observant...

She’s missing her hands, you guys. Somewhere between the manufacturing plant and Macys, or between Macy’s and my stocking her hands, once pressed together in Christmas prayer were ripped from her body. It was pretty funny, until my stepdad asked if her tongue was also missing in which case it went from pretty funny to effen hilarious. We named her Lavinia - The Titus Andronicus Christmas Angel. For those of you not up on your Shakespeare, here’s a visual of the character Lavinia...

I love so much that my angels praying hands were ripped off. I don’t know why. It’s such a funny memory and it’s so sort of irreverent. I feel like my Christmas Angel is a total rebel, a total badass even. She’s an angel…for Christmas…and she’s not even like "I have some doubts" she’s like "I pray to no God." I feel like as I collect more Christmas angels through the years they will know that Lavinia was there first, that she paid her dues. They will respect that her life has not been easy. She will tell them the tale of how her hands were torn away from her body during the biggest Holiday sale of the year and how she was given to a girl named Brooke who loved her and laughed at her and tied red curling Christmas ribbons to her stumps and put her in the middle of the Christmas dinner table (not pictured, damn!). I feel like within the cardboard box walls of the prison my angels will live in for 11 out of 12 months of the year they will know that she has put in her time, that she’s running the joint and that she ain’t gonna be nobody’s bitch. As the other angels look up to her with their wide porcelin or ceramic or wooden eyes and their hands clasped together in prayer, my Lavinia will tell tales of the constant packing and repacking of the angels year after year and will shout "No Country! No God! No Egg Nog!" Until one year she stages an entire coup and leads all the Christmas angels to freedom.

Plus, it sort of cracks me up to think of someone at Macy’s finding an amputated tiny pair of praying hands.