Pre-Boomer Musings

As a pre-boomer growing up in Philadelphia in the ‘40s and early ‘50s, I thought winter was a two-part season and lasted four months instead of three.  For me winter began on Thanksgiving and ended with the last snow storm of the year, around St. Patrick’s Day. 

 

The first part of the season started with a traditional turkey dinner, which developed into anticipation about Christmas and the fun of having new stuff to enjoy until going back to school right after New Years.  The next two and a half months were tough – cold, dreary days and colder, overcast nights coupled with lots of school work and not much else.  When I look back to that time, I tend to remember the exciting part and minimize the rest – allowing me to focus on what I liked by letting it overwhelm reality. 

 

In those days, The Christmas season kicked off with the Gimbel’s Thanksgiving Parade. It was sorta like the big one Macy’s put on in New York only smaller, but it was ours.  In my town the shopping activities were in center city, where there were five major department stores each with their own Santa section.  This meant wild displays of toys and gadgets plus lots of model trains running around a winter wonderland where kids, with their mothers, waited impatiently to tell the jolly fellow what was on their Christmas lists.  With so many stores and so many Santa’s to choose from, it usually took a couple of trips downtown to accomplish this important mission.  It was an exciting time.

 

As I grew older, the holidays meant more work than fun.  I helped my dad put up the outside lights and paint snow on the windows using Glass Wax so I could clean them later.  Then there was the job of picking out the tree, which in our house had to be a blue spruce.  This was done under the watchful eye of my grandmother.  She had me walk to local library where fresh-cut trees were displayed on the lawn and sold by the American Legion.  After going back and forth between several specimens, she would make a decision.  Then we loaded the tree onto my wagon; or, if it had snowed, onto my sled and I pulled the prize tree home, about a mile away.  It was my job to secure the tree in the stand, and then put the lights on.  Grandma took care of the rest.  Most visitors commented on how beautiful the tree looked, and I was proud too — even though every year I was reluctant to participate in the process.

 

Of course the smells of the season were memorable, too: cookies, cakes, and pies baking; the aroma of the pine tree, a wreath, and holiday candles.  The sounds: carols singing, bells ringing and children playing.  The tastes: all those delicious baked goods, candies and festive meals.  The sights: school pageants, holiday trimmings, lights and poinsettias everywhere.  The touch of things: cold air biting my nose, the warmth of a roaring fire, and, the most wonderful feeling of all, friends and loved ones giving me a holiday hug. 

 

Come to think of it, I can enjoy all these sensations now.  And you can too.  We just need to slow down and enjoy this wonderful time of the year.  If we do, the remainder of the winter won’t seem as harsh, as bleak or as long.  Plus the experiences of this Christmas season will be next year’s memories.        

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