I’m one of those last minute shoppers and so I’ll always be –
When you hear my story, the reason you will see,
I’ll admit by Christmas time I’m all tuckered out,
And that is one thing my family has always fussed about.
So one year I promised I would try to change my ways
And have my shopping all finished long before the holidays –
And I tried to keep that promise, but it filled me with regret,
The disappointment I had, I never shall forget.
My favorite grandson, Joey (he’s the son of my daughter Kate)
Was begging his mother for a pair of roller skates –
She said “I will not get them for you, I’m sure you’ll meet with harm;
You will fall, I just know you will, and break a leg or arm. “
So I bought him some roller skates, and I put them away
With visions of how happy he would be on next Christmas Day.
In early December that year we had a heavy snow;
Joey gets out his sled, a coasting he would go.
He lines up at the top of a hill to join in the coasting races,
But he wound up at the bottom, with his leg broke in two places.
Early Christmas shopping already had me in its clutches,
I couldn’t give Joey roller skates, when he was needing crutches.
Then my brother Charlie loves candy, the taffy chewy kind,
So I ordered five pounds of homemade from a friend of mine.
His wife calls me a few days before Christmas, and this is what she said:
“You’ll never know your brother Charlie, he hasn’t a tooth left in his head.’
So I passed that gift out to the children on the street,
And another Early Shopping gift had gone down in defeat.
Then my gift for cousin Bessie, I’ll never live this down –
She weighs about 270 and lives way out of town.
The only time we see each other is at Christmas time each year,
Either we will visit them or they come to visit here.
Now she is awfully hard to buy for, but at a bargain sale one day,
I found a lot of lovely extra sized lingerie.
I was so thrilled with that gift, I could just see her big eyes shine
When she opened up that box and saw that Christmas gift of mine.
Now she had said in her letters she’d have a big surprise for me,
But not a hint did she give of what that surprise would be.
Well, I was surprised all right when she came around,
The surprise was a diet she was on and she took off 80 pounds.
I could not give a size 52 to someone who now wore a 38,
And I hud to rush out and gel another gift, before is was too late.
I don’t mind telling you that extra sized stuff is still up on the shelf,
Maybe I’ll get big enough some day to wear the stuff myself.
Then I wrapped up several packages that I failed to mark,
And in order to find out who they were for, I had to tear them apart.
Well that’s my story folks, and I’m sure you will agree
That early Christmas shopping, was never meant for me.