CHRISTMAS GIFTS

1945

Momentous events swirled around us that Christmas, and though I may not have known what they were then, I absorbed feelings, read distress or calm in gestures, and heard it in tones of voice
as all children do.

These stand out:
January 20th, Franklin D. Roosevelt was inaugurated to a 4th term as President of the United States.  April 4th, American troops liberated their first Nazi death camp in Germany.  April 12th, President Roosevelt died suddenly at Warm Springs, Georgia and Vice President Harry Truman became the 33rd President.  On August 6th, the United States dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan, and on August 9th dropped a second one on Nagasaki.  August 14th Emperor Hirohito announced Japan's surrender on the radio, signaling that the second World War was officially over.  In a lighter vein, on October 29th the first ballpoint pens went on sale for $12.50 each at Gimbels Department Store in New York City, and one warm June day,
I received my first one after kindergarten graduation.

1949

1963
(a guess, but definitely early sixties)
Learned this poem by heart to perform a recitation for family and friends as my gift to them that year, and much later, in my sixties, I repeated it for my Massachusetts friends but needed the script for some parts.  Here is the poet himself recorded February 22, 1952 at Steinway Hall in New York.

 https://youtu.be/Hv4-sgFw3Go

1991
This little book, a tender tale about the passage of time, came from my old friend and Visual Arts classmate, Theresa.  It emerges from my Christmas Box to join the figurine each year.

2015
What could be more joyful than melt-in-your-mouth
chocolate truffles in the morning from my sweet neighbors,
Talbot, Jenny and Sami-Rose.


***

May our sorrows melt away.

May all have a thoroughly delicious day.