A long lasting tradition

Just a few short weeks after Charlie's birthday party, Jenny and Jason were getting ready to deliver on their promise to repurpose some of Charlie's gifts. Though it was a bit later than planned, they had separated Charlie's gifts in those he wanted and could use and those that he had outgrown or would soon outgrow. Finishing the up with the preparations a rough three weeks after his party. Jenny wrapping up the repacking of the final few gifts today and adding them to the pile of gifts that had been reserved for the orphanage, all of them packed and ready to go. The only thing left to do was to actually get the gifts to the children. But while they were contemplating whether they should bring the gifts in person or have them brought through a delivery service or someone else, as they were currently both still very busy, time continued to pass by. Meaning that even more time would come to pass before the gifts would get to reach the children.

When they were discussing this particular topic during one of their short breaks in the weekend, Susan was present for their talk. "How about Wednesday. I should be finishing my classes around four. We could go before dinner?" Jason shook his head. "No, I have a meeting that day that lasts till at least seven. How is your Sunday?" But this time it was Jenny rejecting the idea. "No can do. I have a weekend shift at the hospital." This went back and forth for a few minutes before they came to the conclusion they wouldn't come to a solution right now. But when Susan suggested that she could go in their stead, they rejected their offer. Feeling that it wasn't right to push that responsibility on her. So, instead they decided to postpone the continuation of their date picking for another time.

After yet another week passed and they still hadn't found a single day to go by the orphanage that was close by, they were forced to forgo the visit and let their kind thoughts reach the children through someone else's hand. And so promised, so done. Though they themselves wouldn't be able to visit the orphanage in person, in the end they had managed to find a perfect solution and middle ground for their little problem. Accompanied by his grandmother, Charlie was given the task to hand his gifts over himself to the young little orphans around his age. Since they were his gifts in the first place, it was only right that he would be the one to get the credit for giving them away. Plus it would provide him with a playdate so grand that it should help develop his social skills so that they could catch up with his far advanced mental skills.

Despite Charlie not being very fond of visiting other children or other people in general, aside from those whom he himself had approved, he seemed to enjoy this particular visit a lot. When he first entered he was a bit quiet and observant but from the moment he handed his first gift to a child he found deserving, he started to feel more at ease. With each gift he handed over, with each smile he saw on another child's face, the more his own smile started to appear on his face. As the day progressed, Charlie's reserved attitude decreased and he truly started to behave like he was on a playdate. Interacting with one child after another. Resulting in wonderful recordings of the day and in Charlie learning about the joy of giving after having learned the joy of receiving just a few weeks ago.

Each picture that his grandmother snapped, each video she took of the endearing boy and sent to his parents was full of smiles and worthy to be posted in a magazine with his photogenic features. Making this day the start of a long lasting tradition for the young Westwood, who would be stepping in the shoes of his generous family early on. As it was certain that next year and the year after there wouldn't be much different from this year. Not in terms of the amount of gifts he would be receiving nor in the number of attendees that would not realize the big difference in his mental and physical age. Most likely resulting in there being many gifts to give away to those less fortunate after each of his upcoming few birthdays.

This was a prediction both his parents and grandmother were convinced of and willing to put money on since most of the guests at his birthday would probably be shopping for his physical age. The reason for this being of course that shopping for his mental age was something much more difficult and not something many people felt like putting the time and energy in for a child so young. Especially along with the gifts he would be receiving for Easter, Christmas, the Festival of Breaking the fast and whatever other holiday that he would be spoiled rotten on, he wouldn't have a shortage of gifts to pass along for the foreseeable future.