Texas Fall/Winter thread!

[Bird]

I can certainly understand your feelings and attitude, Jim, and I'm glad for you. And yes, there are certainly things I enjoy about Christmas, being with the family, and especially watching the kids.

But . . . I worked 5 years in the Post Office before the days of FedEx, UPS, DHL, etc. We were the only package delivery service unless it was big enough it had to go to trucking companies. So December meant 12 hour days, and since I had no children, I usually volunteered to work on Christmas so those with children could have that day off.

And then . . . I went to the Police Department. December brought some cold weather, house fires, burglars doing their Christmas shopping, usually stealing from those who could least afford it, accidental and non-accidental deaths and killings. It could be a bit depressing. And again I volunteered to work so those who had children could have that day off.

And I'll never forget the first time I was scheduled to be off on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day - 1969. We had one daughter who was almost 3 and one that was 10 months old, and I was a sergeant working burglaries and thefts. Ah, yes, going to have 2 days off for Christmas with the wife and kids. And then the lieutenant called about 10 a.m. Christmas Eve - Yep, I had to go to work and put in a little more than 11 hours.:laughing: It was after midnight Christmas Eve when I got home, but at least I did have Christmas Day off.:laughing:

 

[jinman]

Bird, when my oldest was a toddler and my youngest a newborn, I went on a deployment aboard my ship to go to the Caribbean for our annual missile training and firing exercise. Everything seemed normal the first night, but we awoke to find the ship steaming at full speed. We and another guided missile frigate were escorting the carrier, USS Kennedy, on a high speed run to the Med. Of course, the weather in the Caribbean had been balmy, but the Med was cold. Most of us had not even brought our winter uniforms with us. We sailed into the Med and east near ****** where we patrolled for the next 57 days straight. After that, we went to Athens, Greece for a few days and then back to sea. After a brief couple of weeks, we came back to the Athens area to Piraeus, Greece where they have a deep water port. We Med-moored to the quay wall and went into a holiday stand-down period. All our uniforms arrived, being sent from home by military freight to our ship. We spent that Christmas tied up the pier there after expecting to be home with family for the holidays. There was no Christmas Eve off nor Christmas Day. We didn't even get to call home. International calls in those days were extremely expensive and there were no satellite communications or internet as there is today. We only had 10-day old letters and wives/families who seemed to blame us for being gone. Being in the military in those days was very depressing sometimes. We just had our shipmates, and we all shared each other's highs and lows. We were close because we had to be to survive.

 

[pacerron]

Bird, when my oldest was a toddler and my youngest a newborn, I went on a deployment aboard my ship to go to the Caribbean for our annual missile training and firing exercise. Everything seemed normal the first night, but we awoke to find the ship steaming at full speed. We and another guided missile frigate were escorting the carrier, USS Kennedy, on a high speed run to the Med. Of course, the weather in the Caribbean had been balmy, but the Med was cold. Most of us had not even brought our winter uniforms with us. We sailed into the Med and east near ****** where we patrolled for the next 57 days straight. After that, we went to Athens, Greece for a few days and then back to sea. After a brief couple of weeks, we came back to the Athens area to Piraeus, Greece where they have a deep water port. We Med-moored to the quay wall and went into a holiday stand-down period. All our uniforms arrived, being sent from home by military freight to our ship. We spent that Christmas tied up the pier there after expecting to be home with family for the holidays. There was no Christmas Eve off nor Christmas Day. We didn't even get to call home. International calls in those days were extremely expensive and there were no satellite communications or internet as there is today. We only had 10-day old letters and wives/families who seemed to blame us for being gone. Being in the military in those days was very depressing sometimes. We just had our shipmates, and we all shared each other's highs and lows. We were close because we had to be to survive.

Jim,
I feel that....
My youngest son was 7 months old before I got back to the U.S. to hold him.
We all sure used to wait for those 10 day old letters and sometimes our answers back, 20 days or more elapsed time,
didn't make much sense as things on both fronts had changed so much by then. Pictures in the mail were really a blessing.
Thousands of folks went through it and are today. The ones that didn't or skipped to Canada have no idea.

God bless our troops and keep them safe wherever they are serving this Christmas season and beyond.

 

[jinman]

Thanks, Ron. As you know, those deployed abroad or aboard ships at sea may not be fighting a shooting war, but they are away from home and family during the holidays. Their days are long and often thankless. I don't ever want to forget the sacrifices we made and are being constantly made today by our armed forces who give so much that so we can be blessed. May God touch their souls and grant them peace and perseverance while knowing how a grateful nation thanks them for their sacrifices.

 

[Bird]

Thanks, Ron. As you know, those deployed abroad or aboard ships at sea may not be fighting a shooting war, but they are away from home and family during the holidays. Their days are long and often thankless. I don't ever want to forget the sacrifices we made and are being constantly made today by our armed forces who give so much that so we can be blessed. May God touch their souls and grant them peace and perseverance while knowing how a grateful nation thanks them for their sacrifices.

Yes, that's always been true for our military personnel, in the old days as well as right now. So I certainly agree with you here.

And I can only imagine what International calls cost in the days when you were abroad. We couldn't afford very many long distance calls within the USA. The first few years we were married, her family was in West Virginia, my parents were in Alaska, and both of my brothers were in the Air Force. We were able to afford to call my parents one Saturday and hers the next Saturday; couldn't afford any more long distance calls than one a week, and probably never talked more than 10 minutes at the most.

 

[pacerron]

Remember the 3 minute calls when they would ask if you wanted a reminder in 3 minutes or just be cut off?
We always said, just cut us off.

 

[Bird]

Remember the 3 minute calls when they would ask if you wanted a reminder in 3 minutes or just be cut off?
We always said, just cut us off.

Oh yeah, been a long time since those days.

 

[jinman]

I remember going into the phone booth with a sack full of quarters and coming out with just a sack. You not only had to pay a bunch of money, you had to get those dollars converted to quarters (at a bank if you could find one) and sit there feeding that machine while hoping the coin box didn't fill up in the middle of dropping your life savings in quarters down the slot.:confused2:

 

[two_bit_score]

Jim,
I feel that....
My youngest son was 7 months old before I got back to the U.S. to hold him.
We all sure used to wait for those 10 day old letters and sometimes our answers back, 20 days or more elapsed time,
didn't make much sense as things on both fronts had changed so much by then. Pictures in the mail were really a blessing.
Thousands of folks went through it and are today. The ones that didn't or skipped to Canada have no idea.

God bless our troops and keep them safe wherever they are serving this Christmas season and beyond.

:thumbsup:

 

[pacerron]

Oh yeah, been a long time since those days.

My dad used to say: "if you can't say everything you need to say in 3 minutes, your saying too much."

 

[blueriver]

I really do like Christmas .. I'd just prefer it don't start in OCTOBER .. But each there own.

 

[NativeSon]

Christmas is for children, and I enjoy it with my boys and the grandkids. The excitement and joy in their faces brings warmth to my heart.

One of my most memorable Christmas was in 1968. I hadn't been away from home for Christmas before and here I was half-way around the world in the Tonkin Gulf. A few nights before I had the pleasure of being High-lined on a very dark night from the USS Ponchatula to the Hanger deck of the USS Hancock(that wasn't a lot of fun). The fun came when we got word the Bob Hope's USO Show was coming aboard to entertain the troops on Christmas Eve. Bob Hope and cast were the Heros that night for me. Ann Margaret, Rosie Greer, The Gold Diggers, I will never forget them. At the close of the show they all came out on stage and started singing "Silent Night". There was about 3000 fairly tough Marines and Fleet Sailors watching that night and as we got to the last verse.......there wasn't a dry eye on board.

That night all of us in uniform dreamed of being home at that moment, but here was Bob Hope and his crew who had all volunteered to come over and spend Christmas Eve with us.

God Bless you Bob Hope and the USO.

Charlie

 

[mikim]

I missed the Bob Hope show at Ubon cause we were still flying and I was on the flight line. I saw them come in and go out - but didn't make the show. Worked regular shifts through all the holidays that year. 12 hour shifts were normal. God Bless all our troops where ever they may be. They sacrifice their freedoms and spend time away from family so we may enjoy ours.

 

[Western]

I missed the Bob Hope show at Ubon cause we were still flying and I was on the flight line. I saw them come in and go out - but didn't make the show. Worked regular shifts through all the holidays that year. 12 hour shifts were normal. God Bless all our troops where ever they may be. They sacrifice their freedoms and spend time away from family so we may enjoy ours.

Now there was a "class act" Bob Hope was great.

I like Christmas for all the reasons y'all have mentioned. I also like the memories over the years that the season has made, old Christmas songs, Nat K Cole, Blue eyes, Elvis and a host of other ones. The old TV Christmas specials like the Boone family. Fire places, cold, candles, lights, Great FOOD and lots of junk!! Grandpa roasting pecans, grandmothers pies, seeing extended family on occasion.

Law Enforcement cut into it as Bird said, but there was more positives than negatives, had to make a few of those "dreaded calls" that really are hard to do, let alone during a holiday.

I guess some just cant handle the "pressure" of the holidays

 

[Bird]

I have always thought very highly of Bob Hope and the rest of the crew that did those shows. And don't tell my wife, but I've been in love with Ann Margret since the first time I saw her, both for looks and for the things she did, such as the Bob Hope shows.

How many of you ever strung popcorn to decorate a Christmas tree? Our first Christmas after we got married, I happened to find a really big Christmas tree that was cheaper then the smaller ones; not as full and perfectly shaped as some. But we couldn't afford much in the way or decorations, so we took a spool of thread and a needle, threaded the needle, doubled the thread and made it long enough to reach across the living room floor and down the hall of our apartment. Each night we popped corn (no butter or salt) and we took turns stringing it. One sat of the soft and put the needle through each kernel and when there were several on the thread, the other one pulled it all down the thread and down the hall and we kept doing that for several evenings and decorated that tree with long strings of popcorn.

 

[jinman]

Bird, I'm embarrassed to admit it, but in that old house we lived in, a popcorn decorated tree would have been destroyed by mice and probably cockroaches. . . mice for sure. I never saw a place with so many mice. We could set 3 or 4 traps every night and 2 or 3 of them would be full in the morning.

 

[farmgirl19]

So why is it that Christmas is the only time for family? Yes, I am only half joking about the Bah Humbug. I don't understand why it isn't year 'round. Western mentioned the food. Many of us have good food, all year, and usually even more in the summer. Go look through the Spring/Summer thread and see what all jinman was cooking, all summer from his garden.

A fire in the fireplace, had that going 24/7 for many days already, and it isn't even Winter Solstice. It will burn into Jan and Feb, so don't need Christmas for that.

My dad worked Christmas most of my younger years. The highlight of the season was driving through downtown Fort Worth, and seeing all of the motion decorations in the windows of the stores. Those were magical. I don't think I have seen any decorations that can compare, even in this age of technology. But we didn't do that Christmas Eve or Christmas Day, because dad always worked those days too. We went the week before Christmas. (After all, no one put their decorations up before Thanksgiving, back then!) We often had Christmas on Dec. 18 or 19, before dad had to go on the road again, or on Dec. 28 or 29.

When I began flying freight, many times we'd get the overnight package to someplace like Pittsburgh, PA, on the morning of Dec. 24, and the flight out was cancelled that night due to Christmas, so one didn't get home until the morning of the 26 or 27. Same with flying passengers. You would fly out on Dec. 24, and flight out on 25 is not scheduled, so you don't get home until 26 or 27. The neat things was, those with small kids wouldn't bid those lines of time, so as to be home for the holidays, and they were really nice schedules, so those of us more junior on the seniority list would get them. I'd do it all over again.

One of my best friends and her family have Christmas in July. Easier to get the entire family in town and together. That is when they do gift exchanges, etc.

Yes, Christmas is for kids, and if you have young children or grandchildren, it will be more magical, but it doesn't have to be on a certain day. Christmas has become MUCH too commercial. It lost its meaning many years ago due to stores putting up the decorations so early, some even before Halloween. And if I enter a store before Thanksgiving, and they are playing Christmas carols, I turn around and walk out.

I send "care packages" to friends this time of year, but I also send packages to those same friends the other seasons too.

So, if the spirit is around only because it is a certain day or two, then yes, I will say, Bah Humbug!

I find the stories of not being able to hold your new baby until it is 7 months old, or not knowing where an estranged spouse took your kids, much more disturbing than not having "Christmas".

On that same note, I think Bob Hope and his USO tours showed the sort of class act that group has always been. May God bless them all!

 

[Western]

FG, you're just making "excuses" to not enjoy the holiday:laughing: It is a day even a young girl such as yourself, can "splurge" on delights, you otherwise wont allow, extra good food, 4 bottles of wine chased by 3 bottles of scotch, a young fella flirting with ya in a supermarket!!:laughing: and no one will say squat!! mostly. Don't be bitter......Hey Christmas is a great time to take time off and jump in a plane too:thumbsup:

Bird, We did the popcorn thing the weekend after thanksgiving, yellow and white kernels. One year we even added dried fruit, but that was tough to thread:laughing:.

Jim, at least with the mice, you would have never went hungry!!:shocked:

 

[jinman]

So why is it that Christmas is the only time for family?

It's not the only time, but when else during the year do most people universally have the day off? If you want to wait until the middle of Summer, that's fine by me, but schools and most businesses give people time off in December. If you can convince them to do that in mid-July, more power to you. The kids will already be off from school in most cases. But really, what's wrong with tradition? I don't expect traditions to change just because of me. Honestly, I don't care if a store is playing Christmas music or rap music. I didn't come there to listen to music and just don't care. Sure, I'm surprised to see Christmas decorations and stuff, but if the store determines that they make more profit on that space with decorations and stuff, why should I care?

Is Christmas commercialized? Yes, what isn't? Valentine's Day, Mother's Day, Back-to-school, Halloween, etc. That doesn't mean I have to go overboard. Even so, I like all those occasions and their traditions. I'm sorry that some are so inconvenienced by working a job that is in high demand during the holidays. At some time during our lives, I think many of us have missed holidays due to circumstances out of our control or voluntarily because we worked in service industries that required us to be there on holidays.

Now, I think I've picked on you a bit, so I need to say that all this is said with a wry smile and somewhat tongue-in-cheek. I do believe that personal choices are always there and we all have the right to choose when and how we celebrate or even not at all.

 

[mikim]

We also did construction paper chains...cut colored construction paper into strips, glue each strip into a circle linking it into the previous. It may have been more an exercise in keeping the kids busy with school out than anything else. ....and the weeks leading up were all about peeling and picking walnuts for baking. We'd pick up walnuts in the woods, dry 'em in the attic for several weeks then peel 'em and pick 'em.