This being the Eve of Christmas Eve, I can’t help but reflect back on some of my past Christmases.
As a child we were a rather poor family. I know at one time Toys For Tots accepted good, quality USED toys because I was one of those kids receiving them!
I remember one year when we lived on Main Street in a suburbian town not far from the Connecticut border. These guys came to the door of our apartment. My mother answered the door and then shooed us kids into the other room. But we kept the door open a crack and could see two large boxes filled with toys. And they weren’t new. No new doll I’ve ever seen arrives out of the package without clothes on!
And then there were years we gave back. My mother would gather up some of our old toys and we would drive to downtown Worcester and drop these used toys off.
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Another year when I was very young and we lived in the same apartment I can remember waking to see my mother passing by my room. She peeked in and saw I was awake.
“You’d better go back to sleep. Santa’s on the roof.”
Of course I lay there listening for sleighbells the rest of the night…
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While living in the same apartment, our upstairs neighbor, Mrs. L, called us kids up to her apartment on Christmas morning to see the huge hole that Santa had made in her wall when he came into her apartment. To this day I have no idea how that hole really got there!
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The first year my step-father experienced our huge family Christmases sticks out in my mind. By now I was a young adult, about 21. My siblings were much younger. My mother had gone to Midnight Mass with the sister who is a year younger than myself. The youngest ones were sleeping. So it was up to me and my step-father to put the presents under the tree.
I knew all the hiding spots. The huge walk-in bathroom closet. The bedroom closet. The hallway. I had made three trips back and forth to the tree with Dad helping all the way.
“We still have the hallway closet to get to,” I announced.
“You mean there’s MORE?” he asked. All I could do was laugh. Welcome to the family, Dad.
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A funny story from ten years ago. My husband and I had just moved into our house and we decided to get a real tree.
We went to our beloved Jim’s (have been going there for about 20 years now). Picked out our tree. And my husband tied it to the roof of his red Chevy Cavalier. But he didn’t feel it was secure enough. He slipped some of the rope through the passenger side window and told me to hold it.
Luckily we only lived 15 minutes away. Still he kept stopping every five miles to make sure the tree was still on the roof! And I very dutifully held the rope all the way home! We still joke about that to this day.
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I cannot really recall any favorite toys. However, as a teenager I lived for any kind of Duran Duran paraphenila I found under the tree. One year I got a Duran Duran jacket, hat, scarf and buttons (not to mention all kinds of posters, books, etc.).
And then there was 1989. I was 18 and had just started working at a very prestigious company. My mother convinced me to apply for my first Sears card (my very first credit card of ANY kind!). I applied and got it. No sooner did I get it I spotted a very cool, state -of-the-art keyboard at Sears. It cost $200.00. My mother convinced me to buy it for myself for Christmas. She even made me wrap it up and put it under my bed! Haha!
Would you believe I still have that keyboard today and now my daughter plays with it every now and then? Not a damn thing wrong with it, almost 20 years later!
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This one is my favorite…
Every Black Friday my mother and I would go Christmas shopping. It was a tradition. I was older by now, again probably around 21 or 22.
We were in a Hallmark store and I saw the cutest little Christmas pin. It was a Santa on a snowball. The Santa had one googly eye and there was a little pull string with a candy cane attached to it. When you pulled the string Santa would go around and around on the snowball. My mother caught me playing with it and bought it without me knowing. Then she handed it to me in the car. I still have it this day and pin it every year to my coat. And Santa still goes around and around on that snowball!
Ah, happy memories…that’s what’s Christmas is all about.
bunchesofos