Saturday, December 24, 2005

The A, B, C 's of Christmas Past


The importance of Christmas past in the Charles Dickens "The Christmas Carol" was to remind Ebenezer Scrooge of a time of past innocence's shared during the holiday season.

"I have endeavored in this Ghostly little book, to raise the Ghost of an Idea, which shall not put my readers out of humour with themselves, with each other, with the season, or with me. May it haunt their houses pleasantly, and no one wish to lay it."

Their faithful Friend and Servant,
Charles Dickens.
December, 1843.

While looking at pictures of my Christmas past I could see many of the things that would lead me through to adulthood and unlike Scrooge I have never lost the Christmas spirit. To illustrate this I have highlighted a couple of funny Christmas morning pictures from about 1968 and 1969....

1968

A. Santa, Santa, Santa... How many santa's do you need? This was the beginning of my parents obsession with Christmas ornaments! Today if you were to go to my parents home you would find a few more! 20 - 30? Not to mention hundreds of other Christmas bobles.

B. Black and White! Wow! yes a high tech 14 inch black and white replete with rabbit ears!(sometimes requiring tin foil enhancements), no cable, no satellite, VHF/UHF with 8 full channels!

C. Major Matt Mason!!! Ok if you know me, there is a hard core nerd in me at heart! Major Matt Mason was a popular bendable 8" action figure. An astronaut by trade Major Matt Mason was exploring the moon with his kewl three level moon lab and rover! Even at this age I knew I was a nerd and that sci-fi was important to my future... Having worked on Star Trek the Next Generation and Star Wars in my adult life, my parents investment in to my imagination seems to have payed off!

D. Colliers Encyclopedias! Too poor for Britannica, these poor cousins were some of my best reading as a kid!

E. OK these snazzy PJ's did have feet in them!!! So what! Get over it!

F. In an era of 8 megapixle digital cameras common in the consumer market, these really kewl wallet extra prints from Hite Photo were all the rage in the 60's! Now you could share a print with friends, show your kids pictures at work! Wow technology! I guess Mom still has the larger prints.....

1969

by 69 I had grown out of sleeping in Jammies with feet... I wanted to be a scientist...

G. A globe for my studies! How ironic to be turned to the African continent... with plans to go sometime this year (Things that make you go Hmmmmm)

H. Shouldn't everyone have a microscope???? Yes how else can you watch your sea monkeys up close???? Actually with the annual debacle surrounding some of my Christmas presents, Mom probably thought the microscope was a safe bet... Dad loved to take certain experimental liberties such as mixing the chemicals in my new chemistry set to create nitro glycerin or create sulfur smoke bombs, lending to the pine needle aeromatic ambiance of Christmas! Or the time I built a helicopter with my erector set... It had a motor that turned the blades with double D batteries! Dad's connecting of a 12 volt motorcycle battery in deed did cause the helicopter to briefly fly before burning out the motor in an electrical blaze and an 8 inch divot in the kitchen dry wall caused by the erant fly craft!!!!! Ah the fond memories of childhood.

Oh and by the way, one I didn't mark! The new 25" color RCA TV in the background!!! By 1969 man was landing on the moon and you just couldn't watch the black and white coverage on a small black and white TV... you needed full color for that!;-)


Christmas will allways be full of fond memories, including this year, though I am not going home to be with family, my friends have filled the void, invited me into their homes and shown me the Christmas spirit lives in all of us!

"I will live in the Past, the Present, and the Future!" Scrooge repeated, as he scrambled out of bed. "The Spirits of all Three shall strive within me.

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