Tell me a story of your experience of Christmas past, present or future.
Any story you wanna tell.
We’ll all enjoy them (well, I will, anyway;))
Best one as a kid was when I was about 12. My brother gave me a J.C. Higgins Model 103.229 .22 bolt action rifle with a tube feed. It was made by Marlin. That was back when you could order them from the Sears catalog. I still have it.
I assume you didn’t put your eye out with it?(:))
One Christmas Eve, when I was about 7 or 8 years old, I was so excited for Christmas, and couldn’t bear having to wait through the evening of Christmas Eve, that I went to bed right after dinner (so, around 7pm), telling my parents that I was going to sleep, so I could wake up on Christmas morning.
I woke up, looked at the clock in my room, and saw that it was 8:30. I hopped out of bed, excited that it was now Christmas morning…and then it dawned on me that the family should have been up by then!
I ran out into the family room, where my parents, my sister, and my grandmother were watching TV.
“Why aren’t we opening presents yet??”
“Because it’s still only Christmas Eve.” My mother pointed to the window, and that it was still dark outside. “You were only asleep for an hour and a half.”
One year, shortly before Christmas (when I was 12 or so), one of my best friends and I were playing hide and seek inside the house. I went to hide under my parent’s bed, and there was resting a new portable typewriter. It was under my dad’s side of the bed, so I made the assumption he had bought it as a present for my mom, and kept my mouth shut. (Oh, the naivete!)
Christmas morning, one of the ‘new’ presents (they appeared overnight, although I didn’t believe in Santa anymore) for me was a lovely new portable typewriter! I was very excited about it, and yet again, kept my mouth shut.
A day or two after Christmas, my mom (or parents, I don’t remember) were driving my best friend and I somewhere, and L asked my mom how she liked her new typewriter that she’d gotten for Christmas. :smack: All was subsequently revealed, and I got in trouble for going into my parent’s room to play. Later I found out that my mom was largely disappointed because it meant she had to find new hiding places for the presents. 
My story is along the lines if indyellen’s, although not quite. It’s about how I learned that Santa Claus didn’t exist. I was playing in my parents’ room (not off-limits) and a toy rolled under the bed. I wasn’t even looking for presents, but there they were. What’s weird is there was candy on top of them. My mom never put candy in my presents so 
? But when I saw my stocking on Christmas morning, there it was. I then knew Santa wasn’t real. 
My Santa story is a little different.
When I was a kid about 7 years old, my younger brother and I had a long, solemn conversation about whether or not Santa was real or if he was really just our parents pulling one over on us. We parsed the data and concluded it was probably the parents. Why did Santa’s handwriting look so much like my mother’s? And why did Santa look like a different person every year at my Dad’s office Christmas parties? It had to be the parents.
You can imagine our utter shock on that Christmas Eve when, just as we kids were drifting off to sleep (we 3 shared a room back then), we heard sleigh bells jingling. They sounded like they came from up on the roof, even! We tumbled out of our beds like a roiling wave and ran into the living room, where my parents – both of them – were casually listening to music and sipping hot drinks as they enjoyed the Christmas tree.
“What is it?” My father asked, looking at us bemusedly.
“Sleigh bells!! Up on the roof!!” we exclaimed.
He smiled. “Well, you’d better go check it out, then!”
We dashed outside in our footed PJs and scampered all around the house in the snow, trying to get a glimpse of Santa on the rooftop. We couldn’t see anything, and of course it was a mystery how Santa would get into the house in any case, since we didn’t have a fireplace. No matter. We knew how this worked.
After checking out the house several times from every imaginable angle and not seeing Santa or the sled or even any reindeer, we ran back into the house. There under the tree were all our Santa presents, and Santa’s cookies and milk were gone!
“You just missed him!” my Dad said. “If only you’d been a little bit quicker!”
The presents were wonderful, we stayed up most of the night talking excitedly about how we had almost seen Santa and asking our dad what it was like meeting him. We believed in that silly old mythical man for another couple of years, at least.
Years later we learned my Dad had enlisted the assistance of a neighbor to come by at a prearranged time and jingle the sleigh bells outside near our window.
Good one, Dad.
Well, I was 8 or 9 when my parents became Jehovah’s Witnesses. I still remember my mom sitting me down and telling me that it was our last Christmas and not to worry because now they didn’t need a special day to get me something, they could do it all year or anytime they want. That’s what they’re programmed to say to believe they’re doing a good thing, and like most kids I never got much of anything again, not to mention I never saw my extended family again. They weren’t JWs and were “bad association”, plus they usually came around during the holidays, which were a no go.
Fast forward to the age of 39 when I got to celebrate my first Christmas, now as a married man, shunned by everyone I knew for the past 30 years including family but now having left the cult. My wife and I are establishing our own traditions, decor, etc. as we go (I’m 42 now). My wife never got to celebrate (well, I believe she did when she was 1) and now she absolutely loves it. I get to relive some of the magic that I remembered from when I was a little kid. We both love Christmas. I run a Secret Santa exchange for a group of 700 people (had about 30 participate this year) that listen to my podcast called Shunned and I get to enjoy seeing others celebrate their first Christmas holidays each year too.
Beck, why isn’t this a good, good, good Christmas thread?
Seems good to me.
Bad as in badass.
I’m loving these tales.
More please!!
Well, when I was about ten, my sister (about age seven at the time) got a kitten for Christmas. The little guy was old enough to be adopted out, but the excitement of my sister and the unfamiliar surroundings must have unnerved the kitten. He spotted the tree, and proceeded to climb to the top of it–where his weight, small as he was, caused the tree to tip over and fall. Ornaments smashed, and gifts were crushed. The kitten sprang unharmed from the wreckage (the first of his nine lives?), and spent the next few hours under the sofa.
He spent the next 16 years with us, and became a treasured member of the family. Every one of those years, on Christmas Day, my Mom would tell him to not climb the Christmas tree this year. We all got a laugh out of that. He must have understood Mom, because he never climbed the tree again; he was more interested in playing with the ribbons and whatnot from the presents.
When I was about 6 all I wanted was pets. Any pets.
My Mother had a Siamese cat who hated all us kids.
My oldest brother had a hunting dog I tried to befriend. I stole hamburger meat from the counter thawing for supper, for him, once. That didn’t go over well.
I was so happy on Christmas morning to see a bird cage with my name on it. Too bad there was a tiny deceased parakeet in the bottom of the cage. Apparenty Buddy Budgie was shocked to be moved in the cold on Christmas eve. I cried and cried. Daddy took the cage and said he would take the bird to the hospital. He came home and Buddy was chirping and singing. My faith in Christmas was restored.
Just so happen the Petshop owner played Poker with my Daddy every week.
My best Xmas involved underage incest so I’ll skip that here.
All other youthful Xmases just blur together in memory.
Well, one Xmas the house didn’t burn down, so good.
Santa still is late delivering my atomic helicopter.
A later holiday story: Family had gathered from across the US in the older generation’s Sierra Nevada retreat. The kitchen was stocked to feed the multitudes. Then a blizzard blew in and knocked out power and roads for a few days. Xmas dinner was canned beans stewed atop an iron fireplace. Overnight thaw let us all drive to the local Chinese restaurant where for Xmas Day Dinner we absorbed much wine along with honey almond prawns, yak chop suey, and more. The house’s uneaten victuals were donated to the food bank and the womenfolk didn’t have to clean up after dozens of sloppy eaters.
Our new tradition: Eat out, let paid staff do the work.
Ya think?
One Christmas when I was about 13 (1975ish) I asked for and received the Beatles Red Album (62-66). I loved it, but was a little disappointed by the fact that The Beatles were singing so many cover songs. Well, I soon found out that no, in fact these were Beatles songs (most of them) and what I’d been hearing all along were other people covering The Beatles.
That blew my mind and turned me into a major Beatles fan right then and there.
NVM.
Nvm.
X2!
Ahh, your daddy. Sounds like he was a great guy.
You want badass? I got badass. This was some 20 years ago…
One year at my 3 kids’ elementary school, the PTA president tells me that the parent who usually dresses up as Santa Claus would be vacationing, and would I want to fill in? The PTA already owned a good quality Santa suit. Sure!, I says.
My youngest, she’s my only daughter and my princess and still today she is my best friend, she was in 1st grade back then and when I entered her classroom I could see her looking at me sideways funny. I realized that she recognized my voice even though I tried to disguise it. She had already heard my booming and gregarious “Ho Ho Ho!” coming from the next door classrooms. But now in her classroom, visually her eyes were telling her it was Santa but her ears were telling her it was Daddy. She had a quizzical look in her eyes. I’d even changed my eyeglasses, wore my old military issue ones, to try and throw her off, but it didn’t help much. And then when I sat down and had each kid on my lap, when it was her turn she looked into my eyes VERY suspiciously — from 6” away her eyes had a look that was knowing-but-not-certain. It was an odd moment for me as I realized I’m the one, right here and right now and in this way, who’s informing her that Santa isn’t real.
That night at home she said that one final giveaway was when she was on my lap, she spied my wristwatch. Damn! I forgot about that.
The badass part was that this was in San Francisco, and I rode a motorcycle back then. It’s a small city and their school was near the north end and we lived in the south, and riding through The City dressed as Santa on a large BMW dual sport bike elicited some nice smiles and waves along my way. Hurried men in suits in the Financial District near Market Street would stop and smile. I enjoyed that ride and took the scenic routes on city streets to/from.
My two older boys were in 5th and 3rd grades that year. I had made friends with one teacher, Gerry, and the kids got a kick out of me picking him up and walking around carrying him like a baby cradled in my arms and asking him what he wanted for Christmas.
The Special Ed classroom was touching. The teacher introduced me and hinted to Santa that some of the kids might be intimidated by a large man in a bright red suit, especially if his Ho Ho Hos were done with a loud voice (she could hear me in the nearby classrooms). Quietly and slowly, almost whispering to those kids, I said hello and carefully gauged their reactions as I walked around. I only had a few minutes and I wanted to earn their trust, and I was careful. I got down low, on the floor, and lay sideways so that they were looking down at me as I talked. The whole visit was special. Those kids were special. It was a magical few minutes for me. A few days later I checked in with that teacher to see how it went — really, I introduced myself to her, as I hadn’t met her before. I was happy to learn that it was a very good experience for her kids.
The whole thing was lots of fun! The next year the PTA needed a Santa substitute again, and so I got to do it all over again. This time as I entered the classrooms of the older kids I could hear them whispering to each other, “It’s Mr. Bullitt! It’s Mr. Bullitt!”
I did it those two times, all in all. The third year, the usual guy was back in town and he wanted his old job back. And I don’t blame him. It was really great for me, very special, and the kids had fun, and I also made it fun for the teachers too. Those were two great days for me.
And riding through San Francisco on my motorcycle dressed as Santa, well I thought that was pretty badass.
One Christmas morning, when my brother and I were little, we came downstairs and found no gifts. Then our father appeared with the gifts. And he was dressed in a full Santa costume that he had rented. We took one look at him and burst out laughing. Dad had an explosive temper and didn’t like being laughed at for any reason. He threw the presents on the floor and stormed out of the room. He spent the rest of the day, sans costume, cursing, stomping around, slamming doors and throwing things, his usual blind rage to which we were well accustomed.
That sounds bad, bad, bad indeed! :eek: Miss beckdawrek would be proud!
Can we include our bad, bad, bad New Year stories in this thread too?
Okay, here’s my cool, cool, cool Christmas story. Did I mention just recently that I worked (and lived) at a research lab with dolphins in Honolulu? Yes, I did:
I was there from 1980 to 1984. The lab was staffed by a director, two associate directors, several grad students (two of whom also lived at the lab), and a bunch of volunteers. I was a part-time mostly volunteer. For the Christmas break, everybody tended to go home to wherever they really lived. Even the upper-level staff, who lived locally, weren’t around much. Just me. I had nowhere else to go.
So, on Christmas Day (1981 I think, maybe 1982) I was there all alone, just me and two dolphins, on Christmas Day. I thawed out the frozen fish and fed them, morning and afternoon. This was all outdoors in a pouring rainstorm, and all I was wearing was swimming trunks and sandals. Feeding is a time-consuming process, as a meal consisted of 40 or so fish for each dolphin, hand-fed one fish at a time.
Being out in the rain like that on Christmas Day is cool, but in Hawaii that’s not too bad. It was comfortably cool, not bone-chilling cold. That’s about as cold as it ever gets in Hawaii, even in the winter rain.
Here’s a pic by the way, taken in somewhat brighter weather.
Next up: Okay, I’ll tell you about my bad, bad, bad New Year stories.