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SENIOR SELECTIONS DECEMBER 2019 - Christmas Memories
It’s that time of year when we reflect on the joys of holidays past...
While the children send letters to Santa that are featured in the newspaper each year, The Brazil Times is letting local grown-ups share some of their memories of the past in the annual December edition of Senior Selections.
Please enjoy these memories shared by local residents (some didn't want to use their full name, and that's OK, and a few had good reasons to not share theirs at all...lol.)
What’s on your wish list?
When I was nine years old, I wanted a Lionel Electric Train so badly. But everyone in the family said there was no way we could afford that. Yet, as you can expect, it showed up Christmas morning. I will never forget that. Never.
Tom Reberger
I decided I wanted a car for my Ken doll for Christmas, but I hadn’t told anybody, and it was two days before Christmas. My dad made a last-minute trip to Meadows Center (Terre Haute) to try and catch Santa to tell him I needed a car. for Ken It was under the tree Christmas morning waiting for me.
Mindy Godsey
I hated opening a nicely wrapped package to discover socks or underwear. Just made me so mad when an adult would say, “If you had been a good kid, you’d get better presents.” I have been a dad, and I’m a grandpa now, so I get the mental warfare going on in that moment by my family. Well played… well played indeed. If I tell you who I am, they’ll figure out it wasn’t the “bad elves” trying to teach a life lesson all along.
Jack
Family Traditions
My favorite Christmas memories involved our extended family. We had a tradition that for several years I assumed was the norm for all families.
The Phillipses had a pattern: New Years Day was spent at Grandpa and Alice’s (my grandmother died when I was age 3 and I could never get used to calling “Alice” grandma. Thanksgiving was at Aunt Naomi’s farm; and Christmas was at our house. I assume that was because I was the youngest of the cousins. When we began having children, I came to appreciate the idea that the younger they are, the less traveling you want to do. I will always remember the Christmas tree in our living room, always in front of the window that looked down Barrett Street. Roast turkey was always on the menu with all the trimmings.
Families should have traditions, in my opinion. Traditions serve as anchors for our emotional well-being.
Frank Phillips
Every year, when our family puts up the Christmas tree, I drive the kids nuts. I put my favorite movie on for the kids to watch: Emmett Otter’s Jug-Band Christmas.
It’s become my tradition to share it with them.
They are always like – Geesh, dad.
I’m like – It’s The Muppets. What’s not to like about the Muppets? It’s a Christmas movie.
I also like National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation and watch it every year. Which reminds me: What happened to real Christmas trees? One of my favorite memories, when I was a young kid, was getting in the truck with my dad, and driving to go pick out the perfect real tree to bring home and decorate.
Dennis Archer
Our family has a weird history regarding Christmas trees. It starts with the grandparents and real trees until a cranky squirrel came home in one. Next was one of those silver-tinsel trees with the revolving light until the family cat began to tear off and eat the tinsel, and grandpa had to follow the cat around to pull the tinsel out of its bum. The next purchase was a real-looking fake tree, which everyone had high hopes was the last of the Christmas trees. But... The tree was brought in from the garage and put in the laundry room until there was time to put it up. The problem is, a family of mice living in the box got out and invaded the holidays. So I think we are going for a Festivus pole this year.
Ivy Jacobs
Waking up Christmas morning with those you love
I really don’t have a bad memory of Christmas. My dad was a machinist, my mom was a stay at home mom, and my folks worked very hard to make ends meet.
So we all really anticipated Christmas every year. My sister, who was four years younger than me, and I would stay awake every year because we just couldn’t go to sleep. We would fight sleep by playing cards and hanging out together, waiting for Santa. Oh, we would pretend to fall asleep, until Santa came. It was always my duty to check and see if he’d been there yet. We would make it until about 6:30 when we would finally go wake up our parents. I’m sure they struggled... but they always made Christmas Morning very special for my sister and I.
Michael Shaw
Christmas memories are why the holiday season is so magical.
My favorite memory is waking up on Christmas morning with my younger brother to the smell of breakfast being cooked, Bing Crosby playing through the radio, and The Greatest Story Ever Told was on the TV.
The Christmas tree almost seemed to sparkle brighter than any other day in December. It definitely was Christmas magic.
Olivia Provines
I remember as a little girl going to bed on Christmas Eve & on Christmas morning I would get up very early as Mom and Dad were just getting to bed. One year my Granny and I got up at 5am and went through the hall, me playing Jingle Bells on my clarinet and her singing. Really miss those days and the family that are no longer with us.
Rana Joyce Hill
I have two favorite memories from Christmas when I was young. One was going to Midnight Mass on Christmas Eve. I had a hard time staying awake, but it was always a wonderful service. On the way home I remember my sisters and I trying to find Rudolph’s red nose. The other is waking up on Christmas morning. Our parents made us all go into the living room together to see what Santa brought us. The anticipation about killed me.
Chris Pruett
What the holidays mean to me...
Walking a half-mile with the family to get together with my grandparents at the farmhouse every Christmas was the best when I was a kid.
We would walk a quarter-mile to get there, sometimes on the gravel, others on the snow, to get there. We’d have gifts for everybody, eat, and spend time together. They started doing that when I was born and up into the mid-1960s.
Always meant the world to me. It means even more to me now, since they stopped doing it.
Kevin Kumpf
We didn’t put up a Christmas tree until Christmas Eve afternoon. Dad would go out and find usually a cedar tree in a fence row on the farm. Mom and the older kids would string some lights, including a few bubble lights and put aluminum tinsel on the tree. Then dad would take us to Grandpa Tempel’s house for a short visit. While we were gone, Santa (mom) would put out the presents. We usually got one toy and some new clothes, a shirt, maybe a pair of pants. We couldn’t play too long though because we had to do the farm chores (about an hour long) before supper. We always wore our new clothes to Midnight Mass at St. Joseph Church in Dale, IN. We older kids sang in the choir and had to go back again for the 9:00 am Mass on Christmas Day.
One Christmas vacation, I think it was 1965 when I was a junior in high school, my mom took me to see the Sound of Music at the Aster Theater in Jasper. Being the oldest of eight at the time it was a special treat for me. It was the only time I went to a movie with mom or dad.
Also Christmas Eve 1983, if I remember right, the temperature was below zero on Staunton Road. After I finally got the station wagon started, Martha and our four children loaded up to go the 100 miles to St. Meinrad and Dale for Christmas with our families. So cold we could only keep the windshield defrosted. All the other windows had ice on the inside before we got very far down the road.
Larry Tempel
There’s nothing quite like experiencing Christmas when you are a child. That’s when you have your entire family with you. All your siblings, your grandparents, aunts and uncles, and extended family surrounding you.
Being excited that your grandparents are coming, and they are going to be there all day. The atmosphere, the decorations, the food, it’s everything Christmas when you are a child.
There’s always going to be beautiful holidays throughout life, but none are like the feeling you get to have when you are a child. It’s something you won’t have again.
Amy Burke Adams
McDonald’s eggnog milkshakes and driving around to see the Christmas lights was my favorite thing to do. Especially when it was softly snowing, it just made the lights so pretty to look at.
Now, I can’t get my kids’ heads out of their cellphones long enough to open the car door by themselves. Plus, there just doesn’t seem to be that many homes that decorate like that anymore.
It’s a shame. That was my favorite part of the holiday.
Thomas, with some help from Mary
My favorite movie to watch every year is It’s a Wonderful Life. The meaning of the film and how it makes us think about how meaningful our lives are and can be is just special.
Jeff Fritz
I’m sure there are lots of special memories connected to the holidays for everyone. I’m sure I have some too, but to be honest with you, I’ve seen a lot of things in life that weren’t so good. That makes experiencing happiness hard sometimes. You try and try, but you often just don’t feel it like everyone else does.
I’m not a Grinch, but my family and everyone else jokes that I am.
If anything touches my heart, it’s seeing my wife and children happy and healthy. I can smile for them, and I guess for others too. But for a holiday, not so much.
Christmas is about the joy of family and the birth of Christ, I get that. Just hard to put on a fake smile and act happy when there is so much wrong around us. I wish everyone else joy though, does that count?
A tired first responder
Growing up, my family had several traditions around Christmas time that I remember fondly, but none come to mind more than what we did – and continue to do – every Christmas Eve. Each year, my younger sister and I would wake up and get to open one present. We would tear through the wrapping paper like it was a surprise, although it was the same every time – a new pair of pajamas to wear that night.
We would then go about our day watching our favorite Christmas movies (National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation) before going to Christmas Eve church service. Once we came home, my dad, who does all the cooking in our family, would make our annual night-before-Christmas dinner – TGI Friday’s frozen appetizers – before we would embark on our journey around Terre Haute, taking in all of the lights on houses.
The four of us (my mom, dad, sister and I) have done this as long as I can remember, and now, getting to share it with my wife and brother-in-law makes it all the more special.
Adler Ingaslbe
Reason for the season
New King James Version
Luke 2:11-14
“For unto you is born this day in the City of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. And this shall be a sign unto you: Ye shall find the Babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger.” And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men!”
Christmas time, we celebrate the birth of Jesus. The miracle of birth is beautiful, and I was fortunate that growing up on the farm, we got to experience that all the time. So last Christmas, while we were getting ready for the next day, one of my boyfriend’s pigs had a litter of piglets born in the barn Christmas eve. We were able to spend some time together, being reminded of the miracle of birth. It doesn’t matter if it’s animal or a human birth, being able to watch that is a beautiful blessing.
Diana Knox
I always go to church service on Christmas Eve. There’s nothing more fulfilling and empowering with the spirit of giving and the holiday than enjoying the real meaning of the season with your church family.
I’ve gone since I was a squirming two-year-old, which my patient mother helped me understand the beauty of the service. I still appreciate that knowledge today, and I am grateful to her for giving me the gift of the real reason for Christmas.
That’s especially hard in today’s world, where it’s all about buying this or that. Most of the time the batteries go dead and the present ends up ignored. If we teach our children the spirit of what this is really all about, we will give them the gifts of family, community, helping others in need and god’s redeeming grace.