I'm sure you know O'Henry's story of The gift of the Magi wherein a husband-and-wife sacrifice for each other to buy then unusable holiday presents for each other.

The closest that I have come to such a scenario occurred when i was very young on a long ago Christmas Day.

As I remember it these many years later, on Christmas morning Santa brought me a beautiful top which generated electronic sparkles when spun. I was so enthralled by it!  I couldn't take my eyes off of it.

Later in the day we had company and the visiting couple had a little boy of the same age who gave me a present. The problem was we did not have a present for him. Quickly, my mother took me aside and said that we had to give my treasured top to that innocent boy.

To this day I can never forget how disappointed I was, but it had to be done and that was that.

Do you gave a similar childhood memory?