LEND ME YOUR EAR: EXCITED TODDLER TURNS ON THE CHRISTMAS LIGHTS EARLY

The Chinese measure time by the year -- the Year of the Dragon, the Lion, the Dog. In our country, time goes so fast we settle for decades -- the Terrible Twenties, Depression Thirties, Rebellious Sixties, the Extravagant Eighties.

How to define the Nineties is hardly feasible before the decade ends, but our votes goes to the Child: To the renewed focus on children as the whole earth-world's most valuable asset.

The season we call Christmas has always been centered on children in our part of the world, though it is also the time when grown-ups become children again. But how many people of any age know Christmas is celebrated because of a Child -- that the word "Christmas" evolved from the birth of the Christ Child? The birth of the Baby Jesus is marked throughout the civilized world by pageantry, parades, by shining lights and stars, and the joyful singing of carols though many who join in the celebration may not understand the Source.

Very young children are inclined to see the lights and songs as pictures that are far removed from their meaning. My cousin Susan Skinner provided us with a priceless little book that bears this out. Written by Kevin McCarthy, who specializes in children's misconception, this surprise-filled treasure is titled "Gorilla Warfare."

We interpret these misconceptions with sympathetic smiles, having learned how many meanings a single word can have. We therefore beg our readers' indulgence as we present a few of the amusing drawings. One of these is surely familiar to many old-timers. Remember "Gladly the Cross I'd bear?" The illustrator's sketch shows a bear looking cheerful even though his eyes are crossed. His name, of course, is Gladly.

Another picture that may be familiar to a number of readers is a drawing of a bespectacled Sunday School teacher who is reading the Christmas Story to a group of youngsters. The teacher calls on a boy-child, Michael, to name the parents of Jesus. Michael hesitates, then ventures, "Uh, Virg, and Mary?"

The teacher continues with the Story, naming the gifts the Three Wise Men laid at the manger of the Child Who was destined to become the Savior of the World. Through the eyes of toddlers, the gifts of incense, frankincense, and myrrh are three donkeys named Incense, Frankenstein, and Merv.

Eventually, the teacher comes to the Story of God's creation of Adam and Eve, and of how they sinned in the Garden of Eden by sampling the forbidden fruit. "And God drove Adam and Even out of the Garden in a fury," she finished. Her excited charges translate this image into a wrinkled old God wearing a halo, his long unkempt beard flying wildly in the wind -- driving the two sinners out of the Garden in a car designated as a FURY.

In 1994, on Thanksgiving Morning, a treasure of a toddler named Curran Hennessey, with his mother, the former Beth Rader, dropped by wish me a Happy Thanksgiving. Curran, who would turn two in a week's time, proved an independent creature brimful of vigor and curiosity. Despite his mother's efforts to curb his active nature, Curran managed to press every button and de-lid every lidded thing within his grasp. Merely investigative at first, his fingers took wings when they felt candy inside the lids. Our little toddler promptly became a bundle of joy.

Still toddling along, the joyful bundle caught sight of a small box beside my bed. The box had buttons! But it was his mother who asked what the box was for.

Press the red button, I explained without thinking, and a beep would trigger colored lights -- Christmas-tree lights! -- red, green and gold. But press only if the owner need help.

Before Beth could shout "NO!", the beeper beeped. And so, for one ecstatic moment, William Curran Hennessey got to see those glorious Christmas lights flash! Perhaps the real glory, to Curran, was that he did it himself!

Our Lifeline lights, of course, are only a security blanket for those of us who live alone. Our real help comes from Above.

MERRY CHRISTMAS

Aileen Lorberg is a language columnist for the Southeast Missourian.