Guest Post - Christmas Memories from Raye

Hi, I’m RawMilkStar’s little sis, Raye. Although I have few memories of Christmas over the years, here’s what I can recall. Sis, maybe you can fill in the blanks? Maybe you can let me know if these are real or just imagined.

One Christmas we all got sweaters. They were those long knitted ones with belts. I don’t think I really liked mine.

I have a vague memory of those sweaters. They were store bought... I do not remember at all who gave them to us though. I have a vague memory that they were all the rage at that time.

Every Christmas Dad sent a card with money—I think, which made me miss him. One year he left his driver’s license on our lawn to let our mother know he had dropped by to see us. Were we gone? Why didn’t he just knock on the door? Was that Christmas? I don’t know.

I don't think it was Christmas, but it could have been. We lived at the white house (at the YMCA), so I would say it was probably in 1973... do you remember how our stepbrother Sol used to get up really early in the morning on the weekends? He used to get in a lot of trouble for doing that. Anyway, he actually saw our father drop his driver's license. If I remember correctly, our mother found the driver's license, but Sol had been afraid to say anything because he knew he would get into trouble if anyone knew he was up early in the morning. Finally, I'm sure due to interrogation methods being employed, he admitted he had seen a man and woman on a motorcycle, which ended up being our father and his new wife. When I went up to Oregon to visit with our father in 1980, his wife told me that the cards had been her doing. If not for her, he would not have done it. That doesn't sound too far off base, knowing that most men aren't the ones to send cards, and buy gifts in a typical family.

Remember that Christmas Boogie got us the old fashion roller skates? You know the ones that strap on to your tennis shoes? It was so much fun to skate! Although I don’t remember learning how to skate, I do recall falling down a lot.

I have no idea what you mean by the Christmas Boogie. I remember the skates and I was horrible at skating. I think it was because I was older. I fell a lot, and never had any fun skating. I was envious of the rest of you, skating around the basketball court, around and around and around. I remember one of you would take a broom (while on skates) and sweep off all the little stones that would cause someone to fall. You guys would race really fast around that basketball court, zooming past me, and laughing at me, because I'd be barely creeping along slowly. I just could never get it.

It seems that almost every year we received handmade crocheted slippers from our Grandmother. They were mostly uncomfortable and hurt my feet, until she discovered linings for them.

I do recall that the yarn hurt our feet. They were neat slippers though, always very colorful and pretty. Very simple pattern. Just one large square long enough to fit the foot diagonally, then the corners were drawn up and tied together. Then a square for the toe, and a square for the heel. And a big, fluffy pom-pom on the toe square!

When the younger siblings still believed in Santa Claus, I remember drawing hoof prints along with sled tracks in the dirt to provide evidence Santa was real. That was fun!

Before Mom married The Evil Stepfather and it was just the four of us, Mom and I used to ring jingle bells and eat the cookies and drink the milk. I don't remember ever believing in Santa Claus.

Another year I remember getting a free tree on Christmas Eve. Were we really that socially economically disadvantaged? Did that really happen?

We were extremely poor. Mom was a stay at home mother and The Evil Stepfather worked three jobs just to support us and was fond of shrieking quite often "you STILL don't love me!" I actually don't remember getting a free Christmas tree, but I do remember being the "poor family" chosen by the church at least once, and almost certainly more than once, as our mother was aghast and embarrassed at being chosen "again" on the one occasion I do remember. I remember there were bags and bags of groceries and lots of wrapped presents. I don't recall the actual day, just the bags and boxes.

I think the best Christmas I ever had was the year we traveled to the San Joaquin Valley to see the step-grandparents? That year, I remember all of us (there were four of us at that time) getting the same shoes, and clothes. There were so many trees and leaves there. My favorite part was playing in the leaves. I still love those old trees today.

It is so interesting to see how we are affected by the circumstances of our lives. Personally, this one and only vacation that we took was one of the worst memories I have, and probably why I have no desire to travel or go on vacations. The only car we had at that time was a Chevy Vega. A tiny car to cram two adults and four children into. I remember meeting The Evil Stepfather's parents, and his sister who was mentally disabled. She frightened me. Aunt Nancy was her name, as I recall.

I think one year we all got Sesame Street hand puppets that year. Mine was Oscar the Grouch, my favorite puppet on the show.

Yes, I remember those. The hand puppets were given to us, IIRC by Dougi - Mrs. So and So's middle son. He picked each puppet out to reflect our personalities. You were often grumpy, and were often teased and called "Oscar the Grouch". Dee Elle, being slightly chubby was often accused of eating too much, and was given Cookie Monster. I don't recall the rationale for giving me Grover, and Sol was given Bert.

Another year we went to the snow. Did we? I don’t know. I remember Jon threw a snowball and hit me in the head. It felt like a rock was in it. I don’t think I’ve liked going to the snow since.

I am not sure if I can grab onto a memory of going to the snow.

Finally, I recall getting lotion, socks, and underwear pretty much every Christmas. One year Mom made us each a towel with our name embroidered on it.

I don't really remember the underwear and socks, but that makes sense. What a practical way to spend a limited amount of money on one's children. I do remember the towels.

We were all assigned colors early on... my color was red, Dee Elle's was yellow, Sol's was blue and yours was green. We had glasses that matched those colors - the only glasses we probably ever drank from, our towels matched that color scheme, IIRC, and our bedding.

Well, that is all for now. I’m sure there are many more Christmas memories in my mind that will remain locked and hidden there for some undetermined amount of time. Hopefully, when they do emerge, they are positive and happy, like I wish them to be.

Thank you, dear sister. I hope this helps clear up some things for you. The photos are from my childhood collection (not many). I am pretty sure the first picture was Christmas at the white house. There is a small Christmas tree on the bookshelf to the left and a Christmas decoration on the wall behind us, I think. It was probably 1973.

Until next time.

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Mom Mysteries - Guest Post

Here I am, guest posting. My name is Kev. I prefer to be called that, anyway. I normally post on my blog, Winter Ends Too Soon, but here I am. I am Raw milk's second son, also her favorite son, known as "the good son." Who says the first son is always the best?

Now that you know who I am, on to the post. I will be posting about things my mom told me when I was young that I simply had to take on faith. I refer to these as "Mom mysteries."

First, driving. I am listing these in chronological order as best I can, and driving was probably first.

I never understood how my mom found her way about the world- or how anyone else did, for that matter. I must have asked her how she did it, but I don't remember the answer. Now, being almost 15 years older, I can see how simple it is.

I could recognize landmarks, but I had no grasp of time passage nor miles traveled. I used to wonder, if we got in an accident and my mom and brother died, how would I get home? From that point on, I unsuccessfully attempted to learn the routes. I could not. Apparently, I didn't know that getting home would be the least of my concerns if my brother and mom died. I had a small brain.

Mom comments: Actually the reason you couldn't recognize any landmarks is because you - being 3 years old fifteen years ago - were strapped into a car seat and you couldn't see over the window sill. All you could see was blue sky and clouds. Hardly ideal for finding one's way back home. Oh, how you hated the wretched car seat, but you knew the car wouldn't start unless you were strapped in. On more than one occasion you managed to squirm your way out of the car seat while we were on the road and moving, and I would have to turn off the engine, coast to the side of the road and strap you back in. Finally I learned that it was necessary to turn the front plate of the car seat around and around, twisting until the shoulder straps were snug against your little chest. Then all was well, you were securely incarcerated in the car seat, the engine would stay running and you were back to being hopelessly lost watching the clouds and blue sky.

Then, there was the TV viewing schedule that I never quite got.

I once watched Bugs Bunny VS. that giant, hairy red monster with eyes he messes with sometimes. I was hooked. I told my mom with the utmost of urgency that we HAD to find out when this show was on! It was probably Looney Tunes. I hate that title.

Back then, we didn't have guides on the TV like we do with cable/satellite nowadays. I mean, we, as in I, didn't. So she said "it's on from [time] to [time]." I, surely in an annoyingly screechy voice, declared "Mooom, how can you know that?! It just now went over! We didn't see the beginning! Oh God, this isn't happening! This is NOT happening!"

I had no grasp of time. She told me, "Because shows are 30 minutes long," but I was too stupid to understand. "So what?!" I thought. "That doesn't matter! We don't know what time it came on!" I am actually unaware if I verbalized this or not. Needless to say, with hindsight...uhh, she was right.

As usual.

Then there was Donkey Kong Country. Even back then I enjoyed video games, and I credit Donkey Kong Country for teaching me hand-eye coordination. I don't know how, but it did. (BTW, back then I thought there were only 2 or 3 games for SNES.)

I loved the game, but it was too challenging for me at the higher levels. Or, I think so, at least. I believe I beat the game, but have no memory of it (except the final boss battle; maybe it already had a completed file on it). Even on subsequent playthroughs (as recently as 2004), I was unable to beat the advanced levels.

However, with age comes brilliance, and just as I was able to ruthlessly destroy Command and Conquer: Tiberian Sun (I couldn't touch it with an electrified cattle prod back when), I assume I now have the thought processing ability and coping skills to beat Donkey Kong Country. It really is a ruthlessly amazing game judging from my nostalgia banks.

Do you realize how many years of your life you've wasted playing video games?

Anyway, as you may know, Donkey Kong Country was produced by Rare. I borrowed a copy from my cousins, and upon seeing that it was "Rare," my countenance fell, as I informed my mom, my voice full of aching dread, "Oh no...mom! This game is "Rare!" We'll never be able to find a copy!" I was very theatrical when I was a child. Still am. She informed me - calmly- that it was a developer. I forget if that shut me up or not. I wonder how I knew how to read back then. As if I need to reiterate, I was an idiotic child.

And very theatrical indeed.

Now, I could post a few more, but I won't because I'd rather recount this tale.

It was not my mom, but a good friend of my mom's. Me and my brother were staying with her for a while (my mom went somewhere), only a few days or a week, and she said that we could come with her to the store. Me and my brother looooved the store. We'd go around like crazed wild banshees. I was 7 or 8 or 9.

I flew to Ohio to meet up with some Internet friends from whom I'd learned my parenting style. You and your brother stayed with my friend, Michelle.

We were behaving like crazy wild banshees, and she told us that if we didn't cool our jets (she said it in a calm manner; not "STOP IT RIGHT NOW OR I'LL KILL YOU!"), she would take us back to the house and we wouldn't get to continue shopping. I think it was "Look, guys, you need to chill out, or you're going back to the house."

I took a life lesson home from that experience. What life lesson? Well, it appears that kids don't know what's required of them. I didn't, at least. When she told me that if we didn't calm down we'd have to go back to the house, we calmed down (I think so, at least...I don't remember being deported). Once she informed us what was required of us, and why it was required, we, "starry-eyedly," operated on the knowledge she had newly bestowed and we did it.

Wow, that's really all it would have taken? No wait, I routinely shared with you and your brother what was "required". I think Michelle just scared the wits out of you both.

This reminds me of a time when I was (purportedly; I have no memory of it) in a car honking the horn. My mom told me that I shouldn't honk the horn because it was bothering the neighbors. According to her, I thanked her because I had no idea what I was doing was wrong, and once she pointed it out, it made sense, and I stopped.

This did indeed happen. Your father was out there with you and he didn't think it was necessary to inform you and your brother that this behavior was bothersome to the neighbors. As I recall, you were somewhat embarrassed to learn this information.

That's all, folks.

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