Alright, the title should have a disclaimer; “Other than the birth of Jesus.”
I see TBS is going to run one of my favorite movies of all time, A Christmas Story, 24 hours straight again beginning Christmas Eve. I’m glad. It’s become a tradition and I expect my family and I will find time after the presents are open, wine has been consumed and company gone home to watch it.
I was one of those who actually went to see the film when it first came out in theaters in 1983 and have seen it at least once every year since.
From the opening scene to the closing credits, the movie takes me back to my own childhood..especially when I was ten.
But instead of the Red Ryder carbon action 200 shot range model air rifle that Ralphie wanted for Christmas, I had my heart set on a Gilbert chemistry lab with 561 exciting experiments for years of fun and adventure.
I don’t know if my desire for that chemistry set was based on a healthy scientific curiosity or the early warning signs of becoming a terrorist but the thought of mixing chemicals together really sounded like fun.
I pulled out all the stops to try convince my mom that this wasn’t a toy but an educational tool that could one day lead to my finding a cure for cancer or at very least a formula for removing corns.
But just like Ralphie Parker was repeatedly admonished by his mother, teacher and even Santa himself…”you’ll shoot your eye out”.. my mom’s response to the chemistry set argument was “you’ll blow the house up.”So I wasn’t expecting much that Christmas Eve in 1956 when after supper, my parents along with several of my aunts and uncles found seats in the living room around the Christmas tree (provided free each year from Haas & Wolfe Lumber Yard) then called us kids in to open presents.
After going through a few packages containing socks, some new jeans and a couple other gifts parents think kids really want and appreciate, it was over. There were no more presents with my name on them.
Then, just like Ralphie’s old man, my dad couldn’t stand looking at the disappointment on my face any longer and motioned for me to check under the davenport. (couch)
And there it was!
I tore off the wrapping and let out a whoop when I saw the name Gilbert on the front of the orange metal box.
We weren’t huggers in my family so my appreciation amounted to a loud “thanks!”
Somehow, just like in “A Christmas Story,” dad had overruled mom on the danger factor and had gotten me the absolute perfect Christmas gift.
Of course he and mom both had second thoughts when later that evening, my cousin Grouse and I cooked up a batch of chemicals in a test tube on the Bunsen burner that the book called “kitty gas.”
It was as if a skunk had sprayed his load directly into the heat vents of the house with an odor so foul that our company left for home early.
It sure was a great gift, though!
I still have it sitting on a shelf in my computer room to remind me of that fabulous Christmas some 60 years ago.
Sadly, kids today will likely never know the thrill of owning a chemistry set.
Even if companies still make them, it’s hard to imagine parents, who won’t let their kids ride a bike unless they’re padded-up like a hockey goalie, would ever allow them to hold a spoonful of powdered iron over an open flame to see the sparks fly or let them shake-up a test tube mixture of strontium chloride and aluminum sulphate just to find out what happens.
Nope..they’ll have be content with listening to grandpas, like me, tell stories of how we somehow managed to survive those dangerous life-threatening toys we got for Christmas back in the olden days.
P.S. Have a favorite Christmas toy story you’d care to share? Click the comments below.
7 Responses
Great story, about a great Christmas gift. I am sure that you are not surprised that in the early 1950’s I got a John Deere model 60 tractor, 227 corn picker, wagon and 12A combine. I still treasure opening them. I do also remember tearing off the end flaps of each box so I could park them inside at the end of a tough farming day. Merry Christmas and Happy Memories.
I truly believe the cruelest Christmas gift for a 9 year old boy in rural South Dakota is a brand new red shiny bike. 3 degrees outside, snow on the streets, sidewalks cleared of the first 2 inches on snow and a basement with support beams and post to hold the house up! All I could do was look at my bike until March at the earliest and hope I didn’t forget how to ride! Merry Christmas!
Weren’t those trees the original ‘Charley Brown’ tree? But we were glad to have them.
Favorite present ever was one of those tin barn farm sets. I was about 7, having just moved to a Minnesota farm from New Jersey. My mother was a Jersey girl.
I have parts of one just like it that I picked up at a friends auction. As for when I was a grown-up (allegedly), probably my first table saw, on which I promptly nibbled up a couple of fingers, the woodworking equivalent of “You’ll shoot your eye out!” However, like Ralphie, no permanent scars.
Then you get kids and it’s more fun watching them than opening your own presents, except for the part where you try to make their presents work “as seen on TV.” At least the Chinese include the batteries.
Now for a little of that Darren McGaven Mogen David wine.
I still have some of our old toys from blocks to trucks to a gun/holster but my favorite memory is with lefse. Mom would boil the peel/boil the potatoes, add all the ingredients, make the balls and do the rolling. Dad would sit on his stool and flip the lefse. We know who worked harder but it worked for them and the end result was always delicious. My wife and I have carried on the tradition although I help with the peeling and ricing. Our 18 year old granddaughter helps and she has mastered the rolling. Merry Christmas Doug!
In our family, when one was deemed “too old” for some toy or “too big” it was passed on to a younger, smaller cousin.
The same year I got my farm set, I also got a hook and ladder fire truck which was passed down…without my consent…to my cousin Jay. Years later, after reconnecting on the internet, I needled Cousin Jay about this transaction of 50 years ago at that time. One day, I found a massive UPS package on my front step. You guessed it; he didn’t have to pass the fire truck down and passed back up an age bracket, to me, its rightful owner. It wasn’t pristine, but it was still solid. My brother had a matching pumper, which he didn’t have to give away, which I kept. My truck replaced, I brought his pumper back to him on my last trip to Sparks, Nevada, where…for some God-forsaken-reason…he lives.
As for the movie, I nearly 70 years later, still remember my old man cussing the clinkers in the furnace of our coal-heated New Jersey home. Nobody ever had a doubt where my “second language” came from; a WWII sailor, also among the Greatest Cussers of the Greatest Generation. He never got any farther than Guantanamo Bay (yes, that one) but he did what he was told was his part to win “WWII, the Big One” as Dobie Gillis’ dad used call it. I believe he also had the good conduct medal. Oh, nobody remembers Dobie Gillis…or Maynard G. Krebs…or Zelda…or who was the love interest played by Tuesday Weld? How about Gilligan, then?
But, I digress…. Merry Christmas to all!