Candy Baskets

October 3, 2018

She came waddling through the crowd, a smile splitting her face in six-year-old delight. We were at her cousin’s swim meet, at which there was a Chinese auction for a variety of prizes. Since it’s hard for a six-year-old to sit through an entire swim meet, I took her out to look over the baskets. They contained nice lotions, coffee supplies, smelly candles, fuzzy blankets, children’s videos with popcorn. Only one caught her eye—a black Halloween basket filled with candy, a little sparkly pumpkin with flashing lights inside, and a serrated tool and spoon for carving a Jack ‘0 Lantern. All was tied together with a huge sparkly orange and black bow.

It was for a good cause, so I purchased a string of tickets, put our number and her name on the backs, and gave them to her to place wherever she wanted. I did encourage her to put some in a basket with nice lotions for her mother, but she was drawn to that black Halloween basket of candy. One for the lotion, three for the candy. One for some candles, four for the candy. I made certain to let her know that she might not win anything, but that it was OK. We went back to the meet.

Towards the end, Linda took her out, and soon she came walking back in, carrying the black Halloween basket that literally dwarfed her as she staggered forward to the bleacher where I sat. I guess she knew best after all.

I thought about it the rest of the evening, as she proudly carried her basket into the house to show her mother, and divided up the candy into different bowls. I remember collecting felt banners from every souvenir shop we visited while on vacation when I was only a little older than she. And cast iron and brass civil war cannons from every fort or battlefield we traipsed over while on those vacations. The banners are long gone, the cannons sit in a drawer in the garage while I ponder childish baubles that caught my eye even as this candy basket caught hers. I wonder if I will ever grow up, or if the cheap trinkets of this world will forever capture my childish heart. I can imagine God, the ever-patient parent, standing silently by, watching with love as we count out our spiritual pennies to place on the world’s counter for this or that which is here today, and gone tomorrow, trusting that someday we will indeed grow up, and use what he has given us more wisely. 

Her delight in the candy basket amused me. But it also made me think. And pray that as the years go by, I will put more of my life-tickets in the bags for the prizes that have genuine value. Meanwhile, I am thankful for life lessons from a six-year-old who went home happy with that upon which she had set her heart.