The Generosity of Strangers Makes This Christmas One to Remember

As it turns out, Santa Claus has a satellite office in Westridge Elementary School.

Earlier this month when generosity of spirit triumphs, Kansas City, KS, elementary physical education teacher Peter Neri was lamenting to his mother, Sheryl Neri, that budget woes had shuttered the Kansas school’s Secret Santa Shop, where 300 students picked out gifts for their parents and siblings.

Peter Neri’s stomach knotted. He felt numb, and he was depressed.

He summed it up in an e-mail to the staff at Westridge, where his mother is a second-grade teacher and where he had been a student teacher under phys-ed instructor Rob Chapman’s supervision:

“In church last Sunday I finally reached my breaking point and broke down and asked for total forgiveness for the one responsible and all the families that would be affected. For some reason, nothing came to mind and no words were spoken, just tears to my eyes. I truly felt empty, defeated, and helpless knowing that this problem was a lot bigger than I could take on.

“In life when things do not go our way or things get us down is when we rely on God and the important ones around us the most.  So that is exactly what I did. I told Mom about the situation ... and kept praying and hoping I would get a ‘God wink.’”

The wink came, he said, in the form of an email from his mother saying that a few teachers from Westwood could raise raise $800 before the end of the week. That was on a Tuesday.

Within 24 hours, the Westridge teachers had collected $1,725, more than twice the amount pledged.

“It kind of tore at everyone’s heart,” Sheryl Neri said. “People who were complete strangers rallied around these kids.”

Santa Arrives in Kansas
In his email, Peter wrote that it was initially difficult for him to accept the gift.

“All my life, I have been taught that it is much more important to give instead of receiving,” he wrote.

In the end, though, he accepted that “it really was right for a bunch of people far away to give to people they don't even know and aren't affected by.”

Peter asked the president of the PTA, which annually has sponsored the Secret Santa Shop and Breakfast With Santa, to meet him in the gymnasium because he had something to give to her.

“When she got to the gym, she immediately starting crying,” Peter wrote. “She said as soon as she walked in the school, she was overwhelmed with a lot of our staff members letting her know how excited they were about this place that they call Westridge Elementary, and they were going to be providing enough money to do the Breakfast with Santa and Secret Santa Shop after all.

“I then handed her a check for $1726.62 and told her this was truly a miracle that had happened in less than 24 hours," he wrote.

“So, yes, because all of your efforts, generosities and love, you have made Christmas at Junction Elementary possible,” he concluded. “You have affected not only the 300 students here, but you have also affected brothers, sisters, moms, and dads of those children who now get to give one special gift to one special person in their family.

“You have no idea the joy and affection that was shown throughout the building all day long. It was like the first day of school again when you're actually excited to see the faces that matter the most. ... I feel like the most privileged, honored, and blessed guy in the world tonight knowing that the children I truly love, adore, and admire get to have the Christmas they dream and think about every night this time of year.”