I hope you will excuse me while I reminise about some of my childhood Christmases. To me, some are rather amusing. I won't, of course, be able to remember the years but I'll try to give approximately how old I was at the time.
**********
I remember one Christmas when we were living in a house with a basement. Must have been about 1970 -71. The basement used to be another "house" at one time, as it had several rooms that I assume used to be bedrooms. One time, around Christmas, me and my brother John were looking in that room and we found a big box of Christmas presents. We poked tiny holes in some of them to see if we could see what they were. I did see the Barbie doll I wanted for Christmas. Of course, years later, we did tell our mom want we did. (Hmmm, I get the feeling she already knew).
**********
I remember one Christmas where my parents decided that we were going to pick out and cut down our own Christmas tree. It must have been about 1971, as my sister Tina was still a baby. We drove out to a Christmas tree farm. There was just a little light snow falling. I remember we took a plastic sleigh and my sister laid in it until we finally found a Christmas tree. Then we replaced my sister with the tree in the sled (don't worry...we didn't get rid of her, my mom just held her). After we tied the tree to the car, then all of us had hot chocolate.
**********
One of the traditions in our family when we were younger, is that the day after Thanksgiving, we would always go out to the mall and visit Santa, then we would go out for breakfast. One year, I was about 12 years old and hadn't believed in Santa in a few years, so I told my mom that I didn't want to go see Santa. She told me, "Well, if you don't want to see Santa, you can't come to breakfast either". I decided to go with them and see Santa that year. I do remember how much I loved the "walk" to see Santa, they had some really cool animated elves and reindeer and things. I'm glad I went.
**********
I remember watching "Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer", "Merry Christmas, Charlie Brown!", "Frosty the Snowman" and "Santa Claus is Coming to Town". There were favorites then and they are still my favorites today.
**********
It was always the tradition in our family that my dad put up the tree. Of course, he never did it to my mom's satisifaction. She would always say "A little more to the left, a little more to the right". One year, the tree was so tilted that my dad actually had to tie the top of it with rope, so that it wouldn't fall. (I also think that was the last year we had a real Christmas tree). Anyway, my dad would yell and curse the whole time he was putting up the tree. After the tree was up (somewhat to my mom's satisifaction), my dad would then give up and go to bed, leaving my mom, me and my brothers and sister to decorate it. I always enjoyed decorating the tree, picking out my favorite ornaments and putting them so that I could see them during the holiday season. After the tree was completely decorated, we would shut off all the lights, except for the tree and marvel at our work. To this day, I still enjoy shutting off all the lights except for the Christmas lights and watching them twinkle.
**********
I remember one particularly funny Christmas. I was about 16 or 17 years old and my brother John was about 15. My brother's friend Victor had come over. My mom liked to listen to the music of Queen (my mom was really cool) and we were listening to it full blast). The phone rang about 2 am and it was Victor's mom asking him to come home. I guess she had knocked on the door, but the music was so loud we didn't hear it. (She probably thought we were having a wild party....LOL).
We still mention that when we talk about past Christmases.
**********
There were a few Christmases were I was living out of state. One Christmas (1983), I was living in Georgia. My mom had sent me a video tape of their Christmas back home. Watching it, it seemed rather depressing, as I wasn't there and neither was my brother Ken, who was in the Army, stationed in Germany. Times had indeed changed.
**********
I remember the Christmas after I returned from Georgia. My brother Ken was still in the Army and we wanted to send him a cassette tape wishing him a Merry Christmas. My mom had the idea to tape the song "Gee I wish I was back in the Army" from the movie "White Christmas". We taped that song, said a few words and then started taping "animated" toys. You know the kind that says "Ho Ho Ho...Merry Christmas". After awhile, we just started taping any kind of thing that said anything. Me and my mom were sitting on the floor with the tape recorder in front of us, with all these "talking" animals around us and we were laughing unil we had tears running down our faces.
I have also lived in Alabama (2001) and in upstate New York (2003) during Christmas. Both were memoriable in their own ways. It was strange living in Alabama during Chistmas, as there was NO snow. The temperture was probably about 35 degrees (maybe higher). It just didn't "feel" like Christmas. I kept thinking about seeing Santa dressed in bermuda shorts, a palm tree shirt wearing sandles instead of in his big red suit and black boots. (Of course, the day after Christmas, it went down to 19 degrees for 3 days....which is extremely cold for down there).
Living in upstate New York during the holidays was beautiful. At Thanksgiving, there was no snow, but one weekend we had a snowfall of 3 FEET. That was the most snow I ever saw. Between the actual snowfall and the drifts, some of the snow was higher then semi trucks. But the snow there is different. It's like the kind you see on a snow applet. It's just so fine and beautiful.
**********
I'll leave you with one final memory. It is a standing joke in our family that someone will get a "lump of coal" in their stocking. The joke is that's it's ALWAYS my brother John who gets the coal in his stocking. Why? I'm not sure anymore, but I think it started when he was a teenager and has continued every year.
**********
There are more memories I could tell, but I'll leave you with those and memories of your own Christmas pasts (as well as a few gifts for putting up with my stories). |
