Childhood Memories

of the Best Christmases

I’ve been told (a teenage girl ain’t got no soul…) no, no! That’s not it. I’ve been told by head doctors I know (actually, a neurologist and a psychotherapist) that everyone has a different method or a “trigger” to learning and recalling what they have learned. And apparently that can also apply to memories as well. I believe that. Mine is music. During my pre-teen years I was surrounded by music. All types of music: top 40 hits, Motown soul music, gospel music, jazz and whatever they call pre-rock n’ roll music. About the only thing I never heard much of was country music. And to this very day, a song circa 1985 can bring back memories of where I lived, what was going on in my life and how old I was.

During the Christmas holidays there wasn’t a station within 100 miles that didn’t play Christmas tunes. Usually for about 10 days straight, that’s all any of the stations played. I learned the lyrics to every popular and well-known Christmas carol ever made from the 1940’s all the way thru the decades to 1966. And so did all my friends. By the time Christmas arrived, we were so sung out the last thing anyone wanted to hear was one more rendition of “White Christmas” or “Frosty the Snowman.” The likelihood of us ever seeing an actual snowman was pretty slim in Augusta, Georgia. Besides, that would be disastrous! The last time it snowed, the whole state shut down for two solid days. Had I believed in Santa, I would have been worried sick he wouldn’t be able to make all his stops if it snowed.

Fortunately, I was no longer a “believer.” For most children, by the age of 10 or 11 the mystique of Santa Clause and his eight tiny reindeer are not so much a mystery any longer. I remember the exact Christmas I realized who Santa really was. Our parents had saved up for months to buy me the one thing I wanted more than life: an English bicycle. It was a twenty-six-inch dark blue three-speed with hand brakes. The tires were super skinny and were covered with silver fenders. It was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen in my whole life. My older sister talked them into buying it. I was seven years old. I was tall for my age, but at seven it was tough reaching the pedals while sitting. Instead I improvised by standing and pedaling everywhere for at least the first six months. The tricky part was stopping. Unlike the plains of western Minnesota and North Dakota, Augusta has lots of hills. Being able to stop on my bicycle was a lot like being an unintentional kamikaze pilot. I would aim for the softest area I could find to ride my bike onto, holding on for dear life and praying that wherever I jumped and landed it didn’t wreck my bike as it crashed. I’m pretty certain that for the first six or seven months I had that bike, I sported a healing scab or scrape somewhere on my body continuously. My once shiny silver bike fenders were beginning to look like I’d been in a chariot race and lost.

I didn’t care. I cruised the entire city of Augusta every weekend, holiday and many a summer’s day on that bicycle. If my mother had known the places I ventured to, she’d still be yelling at me! Think back to the first day you drove your own car. That was freedom. No one sitting beside you controlling where you went, how fast you drove or when you had to return. That was exactly what I felt the Christmas Santa, i.e., my mom and dad and sister, gave me my first bicycle.

But the memory of the first Christmas my sister and I spent in Colombia is by far my favorite and definitely the happiest I had ever experienced until Ash and I began celebrating ours with our children.

We were living in Barranquilla, Colombia, where the average temperature is at least 80 degrees. Barranquilla was not a particular lovely city. What I missed most were trees. And there was no such thing as a “real” Christmas tree! Their Christmas trees were stripped birch trees, with skinny branches that ornaments and lights could be wrapped around, and some were painted green! In comparison we thought they were pathetic. Back in the 60’s, artificial trees were pretty lame so we weren’t entertaining that idea, either. We wanted a tree of some sort, but nothing the landscape of Barranquilla could offer. Then my sister had an epiphany! She bought a woven bamboo wall hanging and we started collecting the tops of every bottle of pop we drank, our neighbors drank, and friends at school drank. We bought some tiny and medium sized bulbs and voila! We had our Christmas tree!

Always the creative one, Renae drew the outline of a perfect pine or spruce tree and with the pop tops we followed her outline to make the tree. After the formation of our tree was completed, we decorated it with the tiny bulbs we’d found at the one massively sized downtown department store where you could buy anything from tires to groceries. I think of it now as an early version of Wal-Mart.

I was fourteen, living in a foreign country where most days were sweltering hot. Loudspeakers in the avenues and streets shrieked “Feliz Navidad,” followed by some strange-sounding crooner singing “Jingle Bells” in Spanish. Our Christmas tree was a bamboo matt decorated with pop bottle tops and tiny, shiny red and green bulbs. We couldn’t afford to spend much on gifts, as an airplane trip to check out a teaching job for Renae in Bogota was planned.

But by far, that Christmas surpassed every other Christmas I had experienced in my short life. It was peaceful. I was with my sister whom I loved the most and who was opening doors of exploration and new ways to think outside the box.

I learned that it isn’t necessarily the celebration of tradition that has value, but the reason for celebration that has value.

A very special HAPPY 29TH BIRTHDAY wish goes out to OFFICER LAUREN ASHEIM today, Dec. 19. She’s not on FB but you can send her a Happy Birthday wish at email: llashd03@aol.com.