YES, I AM STILL HERE peeking out my window on Main Street, and I am going to share with both of my regular readers some of my favorite Christmas stories.
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My father was a college student in Austin, Texas, during the Great Depression. Travel wasn’t so easy, then, and he had planned to stay on campus during the Christmas holiday.
He got a package from home in the mail. It made him so homesick that he decided to hitchhike home and surprise his family for Christmas.
It’s still a long way from Austin to Texarkana, his hometown, but it was REALLY a long trip those days.
He decided not to open his package, but would wait until he got home.
He walked out to the highway and stuck out his thumb. Hitchhiking was safer in those times.
It took a couple of days to get to Texarkana. He didn’t have any money, but he did have an apple and a candy bar. They sustained him on the trek. I remember hearing him tell how cold and hungry he got.
None of the truck drivers who gave him rides were in any position to feed college boys, so the apple and candy bar (I believe he said it was a Hershey bar) had to last.
He finally arrived home, and on Christmas morning opened his package.
Inside was some money. He could have eaten and bought a bus ticket.
ANOTHER CHRISTMAS story. My family spent one Christmas in California after Dad’s Marine Corps Reserve unit was called up during the Korean War.
This is one of the few childhood Christmas trees I actually remember. The tree was decorated with candy canes, bubblegum and strings of popcorn.
My mother remembered that there was nothing on the tree that was breakable. That was because one of my younger brothers — who was a toddler — kept pushing the tree over.
ANOTHER CHRISTMAS story. One year the tree had only new ornaments. That was because before Christmas, the devil got into a couple of my brothers and a neighborhood buddy, and they went into the basement where Christmas ornaments were stored. They took turns stomping on the ornaments until only crunchy glass shards remained.
My mother remembers that the ornaments were expensive and were from Germany. The boys’ backsides may have been addressed.
ANOTHER CHRISTMAS story. One Christmas legend is that Santa brings switches for the stockings of little boys and girls who have been bad. (But everyone knows that little girls are NEVER bad, right?)
The two oldest brothers crept down the stairs before anyone else was up. They emptied the stocking of one brother and substituted some switches from bushes in the yard.
My parents caught on to what was happening, and told the older brothers that the switches would be used enthusiastically on the pranksters if the stocking items weren’t found and replaced immediately.
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CONGRATS TO our town’s Sarah Myers — my fellow Rotarian — who with her team roping partner won 7th place out of 740 other teams in a bigtime roping competition in Las Vegas. They won a prize of more than $100,000.
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MY FASHION ADVICE to tv and movie celebrities. And there is no charge for this.
Ladies: Please don’t get medical treatment to your face in an effort to look younger.
People can always tell if you’ve had this done.
Gentlemen: Please don’t dye your hair in an effort to look younger. It is so obvious and you’re not fooling anyone.
Embrace your years.
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THINGS I LEARNED from opening (and believing) email: “It’s impossible to sneeze with your eyes open.”
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WORD GAMES. Another set of twins: Rise and Shine. Military recruits memorize this on the first glorious day of boot camp.
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HE SAID: “I think the 24-hour news cycle has helped exaggerate the differences between the parties. You can always find someone on TV somewhere carping about something. That didn’t happen 20 years ago.” George H.W. Bush, 41st President of the United States. God bless.
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SHE SAID: “Never lose sight of the fact that the most important yardstick of your success will be how you treat other people – your family, friends, and coworkers, and even strangers you meet along the way.” Barbara Bush, First Lady. God bless her memory.
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SWEET DREAMS, Baby
