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Thought for the day - December 24, 2000
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Thought for the day - December 24, 2000 |
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Subject: Thought for the day - December 24, 2000 From: katlaughing Date: 24 Dec 00 - 03:03 AM A special eve coming up, today, no matter what your belief or not, imo. There is a sparkle of clarity in the air and the stars do seem brighter, at least here in Wyoming. Of course we are over one mile high, so that accounts for some of it. My sister is a minister and was asking me what my favourite Christmas memories were from childhood, while she prepared her message for today. I told her it was the Christmas Eve when I was about 4-5 years old. Something magical woke me in the night. I remember running into her and her twin sister's room to look out of their window, into the night sky. I would swear on a stack of Bibles/Korans/Torahs or even flapjacks, to this day, that I saw Santa in his sleigh, reindeer and all, flying across the cold, clear, and bright Wyoming sky! Other favourite memories include my brother setting up his Lionel train set to go round the Christmas tree, setting up chairs, passing out tickets and punching them and acting as conductor, describing the exotic journeys he took us, his 4 younger sisters on. He had entire countries and civilisations which he had maps for and even issued stamps for *in-house* mail. Harking back to the nostalgia thread, the other Christmas I remember really well was when my grandma came to spend the winter and we all got transistor radios with our very own earpiece for private listening to only AM stations, of course! I also got the biggest ever stuffed dog that year; just loved him! Please share your fav. memories of whatever you might've celebrated this time of year. Thanks, kat |
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Subject: RE: Thought for the day - December 24, 2000 From: catspaw49 Date: 24 Dec 00 - 03:13 AM I see you're up too! But geeziz kat, I can't take too much more nostalgia! There is no one Christmas Eve that stands out, except perhaps the one where we drove back to our new home in Columbus from Uhrichsville through a tremendous snowstorm, but I was 12 then and the Santa wasn't my priority anymore. The greatest Eves were those days when before I found out that Santa was the spirit and not the jolly fellow who brought me presents. There is NO feeling that I have ever had that matches the anticipation experienced on those nights. Absolutely unique. Indeed, its indescribable. Michael is at that age now and this may be his last year. One of those pieces of childhood innocense that once gone, can never be recaptured. Spaw
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Subject: RE: Thought for the day - December 24, 2000 From: GUEST,Thom M. Date: 24 Dec 00 - 03:25 AM I remember being selected to serve at midnght mass.It was just about the biggest honor a ten year old altar boy could receive. After the mass we all met at my Memere's (Franco-American for grandmother) for the traditional meal of tourtieres (pork pies). Christams carols ringing through the night filled the town with an atmosphere that somehow seems today has gone away. The thrill of walking down main street looking into the store windows in wonderment and wondering if you would get that special gift you really wanted. That year it came a genuine Davy Crockett at the Alamo set. I was the envy of all my brothers and sisters. Sad to say this year won't be so happy as my younger sister was just diagnosed with Lou Gehrig's disease. It is nice to be able to come here to talk and remember.Thanks to everyone here. Thom Maurais |
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Subject: RE: Thought for the day - December 24, 2000 From: catspaw49 Date: 24 Dec 00 - 03:44 AM Its a great place Thom.....Welcome to the 'Cat! Sorry to hear about your sister. Spaw |
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Subject: RE: Thought for the day - December 24, 2000 From: Naemanson Date: 24 Dec 00 - 06:57 AM Well, I didn't make it out of here yesterday. And since this is a positive thread I won't go into why not. I have a lot of Christmas Eve and Christmas memories and it would be difficult to pick out one in particular. There was the time that my brother in law broke his elbow while sledding. There was the year we put sleigh tracks and reindeer poop on the roof complete with foot prints leading to the chimney. There was the year when I heard sleigh bells in the night. I remember my older daughter's first Christmas and then her dealing with her sister's first Christmas. Picking one, I guess, it would be the year we got our snowmobile. This was in 1968, I was 16, and we lived in New Limerick, Aroostook County (The County), Maine. My three sisters and I kept pestering our parents that year to buy a snowmobile, a "sled". (In The County a snowmobile is called a sled). Back then only Bombardier, Actic Cat, and Polaris were available. We didn't care which one we got. On Christmas morning we got up in a rush and ran to check in the dooryard. No sled. We jumped into coats and boots and ran through blowing snow to look in the barn and then the various sheds and out buildings. No sled. We were disappointed but then, it was Christmas and no disappointment lasts. We opened the presents under the tree and as we were finishing Dad said there was one more present in the tree. He reached into the branches and took down a set of keys dangling from a tiny plastic sled. After wolfing down breakfast we drove to a neighbor's house and there in HIS barn sat our new sled. It was a beautiful bright yellow Bombardier 12 horsepower dream boat. We argued over who would drive it home and Dad settled it by flipping coins. My sisters won, darn it! I still have the sight of them driving off in that sled burned into my brain. Remember the comment above about blowing snow? As the day progressed it settled down into a real County blizzard. Dad and I fought the pickup to the bottom of the hill and left it there with the car. Two days later when the storm blew itself out we had six foot drifts across the driveway. We were well and truly snowed in. Those drifts were packed in so tightly that I could walk on them and not sink deep into the snow. In the month and a half that followed the sled was our only way up and down the hill to where the cars were parked. We used it to carry groceries and when the heating oil ran low we strapped a fifty five gallon drum to a toboggan and towed that up and down the hill. It wasn't until mid February that we fianlly got the driveway cleared by a bulldozer. Nothing else could shift all that snow. Oh, and Dad still has that sled. He quit using it about two or three years ago. Merry Christmas. |
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Subject: RE: Thought for the day - December 24, 2000 From: Little Neophyte Date: 24 Dec 00 - 07:05 AM One Christmas I saw this old man who lived in my building walking down the street crying. I asked him what was wrong. He tells me he wanted to go visit his son in The Home, but he had lost his way and forgot where his son lived. This old guy was about 90 years old and I knew his memory was failing. He had a son who was mentally challenged and lived in a group home. I told the old guy know problem, we will go visit your son. I cancelled all my plans, found out where the son lived which was a 2 hour drive from Toronto. The old guy and I drove there, spent the day in the group home celebrating Christmas with his son and the others. To see the joy on this old man's face was worth driving to the moon to see it. Anyway, it was a Christmas I will always cherish. Bonnie |
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Subject: RE: Thought for the day - December 24, 2000 From: McGrath of Harlow Date: 24 Dec 00 - 08:40 AM Thank you Bonnie. Thanks for doing that - and thanks for telling us about it. And I hope this Christmas will be as good for you as that one. |
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Subject: RE: Thought for the day - December 24, 2000 From: katlaughing Date: 24 Dec 00 - 09:43 AM Oh, Bonnie, that is beautiful! Thank you! Guest, Thom, sounds like you grew up the way my SO did, he always went to his Memere's and had those kind of party pies, too. Later on when she lived in a nursing home run by nuns, his mom kept up the tradition. She is gone now and no one makes the pies like hi mom and memere, according to him. Of course it doesn't help that he's married to a vegetarian!**BG** Naes, your story was way too reminiscent of our odl days on the ranch out on the Oregon Trail. We had snowdrifts like that, too! Not so fun anymore. I hope that isn't what is keeping you from going and that you are on your way to wheverer you wanted to be really soon. Spaw, if we could bottle that, we be gazillionaires, eh? luvya'llkat |
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Subject: RE: Thought for the day - December 24, 2000 From: Bill in Alabama Date: 24 Dec 00 - 10:56 AM Ms. Bonnie-- A fine story from a fine lady!
I can't really select one particular Christmas, because, in my family, they were all special. My mother had a special gift for magic in general, and Christmas was a particularly magical time. I remember that she pinned small sleigh bells on the inside hem of her skirt, so that every movement she made was accompanied by a sort of whispered jingling. She trod so softly that, for most of the year, we could not hear moving around the house, but during the Christmas season the little four-room house was filled with that soft music. In an interesting commingling of traditions, she told me that her people believed that on Christmas Eve, just at midnight, the deer in the forest dropped to their knees and looked heavenward toward the Great Spirit, and my grandpa Foster told me that at midnight on Old Christmas Eve all animals could speak to each other in the same language, and that they discussed their masters on this magic night, just as the animals in the stable at Bethlehem discussed their young master on that night so very long ago. Later, researching material to emcee a Christmas special for public television, I ran across the following:
CHRISTMAS IN THE WOODS (Frances Frost)
Tonight when the hoar frost falls on the wood,
I apologize for the long post. Happy Holidays, everybody. Bill Foster |
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Subject: RE: Thought for the day - December 24, 2000 From: Rich(bodhránai gan ciall) Date: 24 Dec 00 - 10:58 AM When I was little, we used to read the from the Gospel story of the Nativity every year on Christmas eve, and when we got to "and she wrapped the babe in swaddling clothes and placed him in a manger", one of us would put the Baby Jesus in place in the nativity. In later years we would do this around the Christmas tree, but when I was really little Santa even brought the tree after I was asleep! My parents would play a Christmas record for me and tell me to stay awake for the whole thing, to make sure I fell asleep. My dad would have stood the tree in the (off-limits) basement for a few days to let the branches fill out. Alternately one or the other of my parents would get to go to Midnight Mass on the given year. In the meantime the other would start to decorate the tree. When whichever of my parents got to the later Mass that year got back, they would finish up. Our traditional Christmas Eve dinner consisted of fruit, cheese, sometimes nutbread, and wine (ginger ale for me). This dated back to my parents first Christmas as a married couple when they forgot to pick up fish for dinner. As Catholics, Christmas Eve is on of they days when we can't eat meat so they settled for what they had and a family traditon was born. When my parents finished up with the tree and putting out the presents, they would have a snack of leftover wine and cheese along with cookies and milk left out for Santa, then wake us up and tell us Santa had been here. They'd watch us open our gifts and open theirs and then go to bed, which we thought was ridiculous considering they had to have gone to bed right after us in order for Santa to have come. Merry Christmas and be sure to get to bed on time tonight so Santa doesn't pass you by. Rich |
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Subject: RE: Thought for the day - December 24, 2000 From: GUEST,Sarah Date: 24 Dec 00 - 11:41 AM A "grownup" memory, some friends and I began carolling on Christmas night about ten years ago. It is still some of the best fun to be had. We gather at one of our homes, each person selects one or two people he/she want to carol, and we mark a route on a city map. We go from house to house, people we know, and they are one and all delighted. When we're done, we come back to the gathering house and make a wassail. It's wonderful, the surprise and delight on the faces of the people we carol as everyone in the house runs to crowd into the front doorway to listen. And we're just a group who get together and hope we've found a good key for us all, not a well-practiced choral group. We take any kids we have around for the holidays with us. These must be old enough to do this for two or three hours, so it has become something of a transition rite for them, usually about the age of seven or eight -- so they make the move from Santa to a sharing of the inner joys of making someone else happy. There's still a lot of magic to be had at Christmas. Sarah |
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Subject: RE: Thought for the day - December 24, 2000 From: Matt_R Date: 24 Dec 00 - 11:44 AM Well, I don't know if I can, but I'd like to wish Lisa (a mutual friend of NightOwl and I) Happy Birthday. She has a computer now...maybe she'll visit us soon... --Matt |
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Subject: RE: Thought for the day - December 24, 2000 From: jaze Date: 24 Dec 00 - 11:54 AM Just wanted to thank Bonnie for the beautiful story. Just as every act of meaness diminishes us all, every act of kindness enriches us all. I have to say, this Christmas will be memorable for two reasons, the sorrow that I feel missing my daughter, but also the incredible goodness in everyone here in praying and shining lights of hope for Patrick. I think this is TRULY what Christmas is all about. Now if we could just spread this all around the world and every day of the year, what a wonderful world it would be . I wish blessings on all of you. Merry Christmas. James |
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Subject: RE: Thought for the day - December 24, 2000 From: Allan C. Date: 24 Dec 00 - 03:25 PM Among my earliest memories of Christmas is of when I was three or four years old. We were decorating the tree a week or so ahead of time. My parents were doing the most of it, I suppose, but would hand a delicate glass ball to my older brother or to me from time to time to hang on the lower branches of the tree. After hanging one of the decorations, I sat down. Unfortunately, I did not carefully observe my surroundings and chose to sit where a box full of ornaments had been placed. Crunch! Shortly after the excitement died down and the breakage was cleared away, I was given another ornament to hang. I sat down. Unfortunately, I did not carefully observe my surroundings and chose to sit where a box full of ornaments had been placed. Crunch! again. Obviously one of us was not learning our lesson from this. Another much dearer memory is of a somewhat more recent Christmas. I was married then and both of my daughters were to be with my wife and me at Christmas in our tiny house. (Kelly, my oldest, was from a previous marriage and spent alternate holidays at her mother's home.) Kelly was about seven and Lacy was about three. My wife and I had been planning and gathering construction materials for weeks toward the building of a gigantic playhouse that was to occupy about a quarter of the kids' bedroom. By Christmas Eve, I had pre-sawn and pre-fitted nearly all of the pieces. There was no way to hide the entire project. I bolted together the frame of 4X4 timbers in the room. Kelly cleverly surmised that it was to become a crèche. I let her continue to think that. (Carpenters among you might wonder at the heavy construction materials. The playhouse was to stand only five feet tall. A sheet of ¾ " plywood formed the roof. The wall on the long side of the playhouse went all the way to the ceiling. But on the short end the wall was only five feet tall. The space above the playhouse was to be used for general storage - sort of an attic. The short side allowed easy access to the storage while the long side wall hid it.) Evening came and my wife took the girls to her parents' house. The moment they were out of the driveway, I began working like a madman. First, I put the plywood roof in place. Then I attached the panel boards for the walls. I cut out the windows and sandwiched the openings between some old picture frames. A scrap of carpeting was put on the floor. Then I built the "stone" fireplace and hearth out of plywood scraps and some old (stone print) linoleum. A combination toybox/window seat was installed. Then a tiny, storebought stove and sink were put in place. Next, the window box was hung and the artificial flowers installed. The mailbox was put in place. And then…well let's just say that I was almost finished when I saw that it was 5:30 AM. My wife brought the sleeping girls home at about 6:00 and put them in our room. The girls eventually awakened. They headed straight to the gifts under the tree. After all the unwrapping was done, the kids wandered to their room to play while they waited for breakfast. When they arrived at the doorway...You have never seen such wide eyes! Such slackjaw smiles! No squeals of delight could have been any louder or more joyful than those that filled the house on that morning. |
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Subject: RE: Thought for the day - December 24, 2000 From: KT Date: 24 Dec 00 - 03:52 PM Lovely stories, everyone. My own memories from my childhood Christmases include peeking out of the tiny closet window in my mother's room on Christmas Eve, and the thrill of seeing Santa and his sleigh flying through the sky, guided by the bright red light of Rudolph's nose. And for every kind thing I did in the days prior to Christmas, I was able to place another piece of straw in the manger bed. I loved that.....And the smell of the fresh cut Christmas tree goes hand in hand with the sound of the BIG old Lionel train set as the engine started up and pulled the other cars around the track encircling the tree. Unfortunately, the old train was "lifted" from its storage space this year......As sad as that is for all of us, I'm trying hard to imagine the expressions of delight on the faces of the children who will receive it this year, and hoping they'll experience the magic we did. And from more recent Christmases, I have a fond memory of the year my own children discovered that poor ol' Santa had ripped his suit on his way up our chimney. Left a torn piece right there in the flue....Merry, merry, to you all.....
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Subject: RE: Thought for the day - December 24, 2000 From: Nynia Date: 24 Dec 00 - 03:57 PM Not quite sure where this posting belongs so I'll leave it hear in good company. In Dublin it's quite common to see civic Christmas trees decorated with cards or momento's of departed friends. This is especially true for those lost to drugs. I don't think this is sad just kind of nice. They don't seem to do it here, but tonight I'm going to decorate the Christmas tree outside the library for my mate Jimmy who died eighteen months ago. I'm just going to tie on a brand new "top E" (he was a guitarist) and ALWAYS broke them so I guess he'll need one by now. Cross your fingers that I don't get arrested.....lol. I think this is a nice way to remember. MERRY CHRISTMAS Nynia. |
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Subject: RE: Thought for the day - December 24, 2000 From: Dave (the ancient mariner) Date: 24 Dec 00 - 04:05 PM Anyone who arrests you for doing that is a real asshole. Good luck Nynia we can post bail if you need it mate. Merry Christmas. Yours, Aye. Dave (who could tie enough to string a piano, unfortunately) |
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