Christmas Day 2020 is tomorrow. This is the time to be merry, it’s the time to be jolly.
It’s also the time to be spiritual, as local pastors frequently remind us is the reason for the season.
This calendar year with the COVID Pandemic and all won’t be forgotten by most people on earth today. Christmas will be etched in their minds forever.
For many it could be different. Those who have been around any length of time at all will remember it and probably compare it to previous Christmases.
I like to think back at some of the Christmases when I was a kid and life seemed a whole lot more simple.
I remember when I was small, about 3 ½ years old, and it was just a couple of days after my mother had passed away. My uncle had given me a basketball and it got up too close to a heater and almost melted it.
I think I was about 6 when I really remember not sleeping most of the night before in anticipation of when Santa would get to our house. I kept hearing sounds like someone was in our front room, but I didn’t dare come out of my bedroom.
The wait was agonizing until I could get up and see what Santa had brought.
That’s been so many years ago, I don’t even remember what I got.
Mother and dad always enjoyed the Christmas season. Mother was the third oldest of eight children and dad was the youngest of five boys.
So on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day there were plenty of people around, especially with my mother’s family.
When I was young, we gathered on Christmas Eve at my grandmother and grandfather’s large house on Northwest 32nd Street in Oklahoma City for dinner. That was my mother’s side of the family.
Christmas morning was spent at our house opening gifts and eating breakfast. That afternoon, we were back at the same grandparents’ home for a midafternoon supper and then to open more gifts.
My parents built a lot larger home and we moved into it in February of my senior year of high school. After that, the Christmas Eve gatherings were at our house, but Christmas Day’s mid-afternoon supper and gift opening were at my grandparents’ home.
Those were good times. They were simpler times. They were focused on spending time with family which is most important in our lives.
Those huge gatherings have gone away over the years. Up until several years ago, Pat and I hosted some of our extended family at our house on Christmas afternoon and evening for an early dinner, opening gifts and just spending time together.
On behalf of all our family I’d like to wish a Merry and very Blessed Christmas and wonderful New Year to everyone!