Christmas memories and musings

Christmas is, I believe, a time for reflection, while New Year’s day is a time to look forward.

My grandfather told me one Christmas that we kids were spoiled with all the gifts my father (aka Santa Claus) gave us. My grandfather said when he was a child he was lucky to get a couple of oranges and a hand full of nuts for Christmas. I still chuckle over the handful of nuts every time I think of his story, after all a guy can get a handful of nuts any time he reaches into his underwear.

Christmas eve 1914 French and German soldiers had been battling for months, living in open trenches just a hundred yards apart. The Germans began singing “Silent Night” in their trenches. The French soldiers did not understand all of the German words, but they knew the melody, so they too began to sing. Soon the battlefield rang out, not with machine guns, but with peace for the moment. One brave Frenchman climbed out of his trench and began to walk toward the German lines two Germans climbed out and walked toward him. Soon others followed until one whole section of the line was filled with peaceful soldiers of both sides. They built fires to warm themselves, they shared wine, rations, even pictures of loved ones, peace continued into Christmas day, when the generals on both sides decided this peace was bad for morale on both sides. Participants on both sides were separated and sent to other units along the lines.

Christmas during the great depression was never spoken about by anyone I have known. Maybe there was nothing to talk about. The only story I know was my grandfather went across the street to O’Fallon park and gathered sticks to make a little barn and manger for under the Christmas tree. That barn was under my mother’s tree when she was young and our tree until the seventies when it seems to have disappeared. I can still see it in my mind. I played with it every Christmas as a child until I outgrew that sort of thing.

Christmas 1942-45 found upwards of 12-13 million soldiers, sailors and marines spread across the world, far from the heat of the hearth in their homes, far away from their families. Most soldiers and marines were gone for the duration. Some sailors got home after their ships were sunk or so badly damaged in battle that they had to return to the US repair facilities.

In the fifties, my oldest memories are few and are bittersweet. One Christmas eve when I still believed in Santa was interrupted by a neighbor on the next block. She and her husband had a party they had to attend for his business. She asked mom if she would watch their two girls for just two hours on Christmas eve. One of the girls was in my class at school, Mary Catherine was her name and I did not like her then or at any time later. The two hours ran into not 8 PM, not 10, not 12, but sometime after. I remember sitting in my room in the dark looking out the window and wondering how Santa could come if there were people still up and moving around and maybe not at all with the evil Mary Catherine there.

Our tree went up days before Christmas and of course there were always bulbs that went out  and my mother would give me a replacement and I would start at one end and put the new bulb in and continue with the one replaced until the string lit up. That was kind of dangerous for a child, but who knew that back then.

Every Christmas in the fifties, my dad would drink his beers when he got home from work on Christmas eve. At that time we all slept upstairs and I had discovered that I could slither along the upstairs landing and when I got all the way into the corner I could partially see down into the living room and on that particular Christmas eve my dad had gotten bicycles for one or more of us, but in those days the purchaser had to put them together. I remember watching dad struggle after having too much beer and trying to get those bicycles to go together. I think he ended up going to bed and finished them in the morning after saying Santa left these but he did not put them together so now I have to do it.

In 1963 I joined the navy and was not at home for Christmas until 1969, so all I can say is Christmases were not the best during that time. Christmas eve of 1972, I spent it on board ship in the gulf of Tonkin with the reverend Billy Graham, but there was no beer to drink, so it got boring after a few minutes and I left the gathering.

1974-76 were very lean years, leading to very lean Christmases, sort of like grandpa’s “few oranges and a hand full of nuts.” One of those years Joyce took the presents I got her back to the store because we were so broke we needed the cash.

1977-86 We both were working with good jobs and Christmases were very nice. Christmas of 84 we had a Christmas party with friends from work and family that was legendary. Joyce had made some of her homemade Kahlua, a half gallon and a fifth. The party was rocking and everyone was into the Kahlua. Around midnight we ran out of the homemade stuff and Joyce sent me to the all night grocery to buy two more bottles of the real thing. As soon as it went into the mix, people were asking what happened to the Kahlua because it just didn’t seem as good.

A lot has happened since then, but as I have been working on this for a week now and my memory is better the further back I go and this is about Christmas and in another day it will be too late to sent it; I will sign off with this picture I just found in my archives last week and the picture is what sparked this story. Have a wonderful Christmas all of you.

This was the old house decorations in 2004.