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Photo is of our tree 1983.
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Ask anyone over the age of 35 in my small town, and they can tell you all about Christmas 1983 because it was so unusual. It was the most unique Christmas eve of my life, and I know there will never be another like it -- I was still a child, and although I was old enough that Santa no longer visited me, there was still the awe of Christmas and the joy of childhood surrounding the holidays that I will never be able to relive.
My dad was working at the equivalent of 911 as a dispatcher. He was to get off work at 4, our annual party usually started at six. I was in the living room listening to Marty Robins and Bobby Helms records on the old record player with the 8-Track tape deck. I was bouncing off the walls because I was so excited that my aunts, uncles, cousins, grandmothers and step-grandfathers were going to converge on the house, and of course presents. (Now I know the real gift was all the family's PRESENCE and not the physical gifts of my Bob Ross Joy of painting set I received that year.)
I drug my small little toddler table to the kitchen. Mom always told me I needed to sit there to make room for the adults. I idolized my cousin who was six years older than I, and I begged her each year to sit with me at this tiny table. She was tall, unlike me, and her knees were taller than the table. But I didn't want to have to sit by myself. She dutifully sat with me, and while I can't remember much except being thrilled she was sitting with me. She would have been a senior in high school that year.
As I was using Windex on the table, "I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus" slowed to a stop as all the lights went out. Mom was outside shoveling snow so Dad wouldn't have to do it after working all day.
I didn't think anything about the power going out. I mean, I was a kid, and Christmas was still magical. Little did I know how unique that night was about to become.
Mom came in, chilled from being out in the cold. I looked up weather history for our town, and winds were as high as 33 miles an hour and the temp had a HIGH that day of under 20 degrees. Mom curled up in her snug sack -- a 1980s version of a Snuggie -- only it didn't have arms as it draped around you. She was in her gold and brown blanket when she picked up the rotary phone that was canary yellow and called her sister. They started out talking about the turkey because Mom was baking the bird for dinner that evening, and she was worried about food poisoning if the electric didn't come back on soon. (In reality, it would have just been undercooked at that point, and since there was no heat, there really wasn't any worry about if it would be "fit to eat" as she kept saying as she also called my grandmother to get her opinion on the fowl.)
I pulled the afghan that Grandma Bessie made over me as I was starting to get chilled by this time. We had natural gas for heating, and it relied on the electric to kick on, so in addition to no electric, we had no heat. I was worried about Christmas -- would it be cancelled? (I have since learned Christmas always comes, it's parties and festivities that can be cancelled.). As I fretted over if my cousin would be joining me at the toddler table, I braided the fringe on the afghan to help calm my nerves. Mom watched the clock that Dad had given her the previous Christmas with worry as she bit her fingernails.
Dad came home at about 4:30 and said power was out all over the area. The substation in the next town was down. He rummaged in the olive green fridge and cussed about all that was there for him to eat there that day was salami, which he detested. After he ate something cold, he called his brother to see how they were. My aunt and uncle were not just okay, but doing great. They had wood stove. My dad wasn't always very good to his brother, but my aunt and uncle invited us down if we got too cold. By this time, Mom was holding our guinea pig in an attempt to keep both her and the guinea pig warm. Mom and Dad discussed the invitation and decided to wait a while to see if the power would return. I was worried about my goldfish, Abraham Elizabeth. I had won her at a carnival two years prior. Mom had lit a couple candles in the living room for light and I put the fish bowl near one to try and keep her warm. Finally, Dad called the sheriff's office where he worked and told Mom it didn't look like electric would be restored anytime soon. So we bundled up and headed to Dad's truck to drive the mile to my uncle's house. Mom wouldn't let me bring the goldfish because she said moving the bowl to the truck in the sub zero weather and then into the warm house would be worse for the fish than leaving her at home. We took the guinea pig in a box high enough my uncle's dog couldn't get to her.
After we got out of our coats and boots, reveled in the warmth, we started noticing we were hungry. It was probably about 7 pm by this time, and we had eaten lightly all day expecting a huge meal that evening. My aunt was going to bring the tossed salad to our family gathering, so we gathered around the table and had salad for Christmas eve dinner.
Dad was a volunteer EMT and he had his pager with him. It was a monstrosity of a thing -- much larger than a pack of cigarettes. It kept going off about Santa being sighted in different towns in the county all night long. The dispatcher on duty was having a boring evening, and for kids like me, even though I didn't believe in Santa anymore, it was so much fun to hear Santa was seen in Tunnelton -- then Kingwood, and then Terra Alta.
My dad and my uncle decided to go check on some elderly folks to make sure they were okay. This was before warming stations were opened during a disaster. I fully expected them to return with a few people, but they didn't. My aunt loved candles, and she had candles everywhere. She lit them all, and it gave such a magical glow over everything. The candle light reflected in both my mom's and my aunt's owl-like glasses, and I curled up on the couch under some afghans just enjoying a Christmas that was so different.
With all the candles, the wood stove going, and all of us talking, my aunt started to get warm. She took off her sweater. She was wearing a flesh colored turtleneck underneath, but in the dim candlelight, my dad couldn't tell she had anything on and the look on his face was priceless. We all laughed about that.
All around the living room, we dozed, until very early in the morning all the lights came back on. Somehow it was decided (maybe because I was so asleep?) that I was going to spend the night there since it was warm and Mom and Dad would go home. I remember padding up the stairs to sleep in the bed with my aunt as my uncle spent the night on the couch. It was so odd the next morning waking in a house that was not my own on Christmas morning -- one of only twice in my life that has ever happened. I called Mom and Dad headed down to pick me up.
Our usual Christmas breakfast of pancakes with turkey gravy was held off until December 26 that year because the turkey was still in the oven, and Mom always made the gravy with leftovers. Mom, Dad, and I opened gifts from each other, and it was later that day that everyone came to our house for the Christmas celebration. It was 24 hours later, but the food was just as good, conversation of the previous night was the main topic, gifts were opened, and my senior in high school cousin joined me at the toddler sized table.
On the first day back to school, our class was all abuzz about how different our Christmas was -- so much so that my 5th grade reading teacher said, "Okay, we're going to go around the room and everyone can tell about your Christmas eve, so we can get back to learning." The only story I remember was of a boy who lived in our state, but his power was serviced through Maryland. He said they had electric but they looked out and saw West Virginia without electric and that their Maryland neighbors had it.
Memories are often formed when we don't know they are being made. Sometimes it is something different that makes the usual unusual. I am sure that this year, 2020, will be remembered by many people for a lifetime. My husband and I are joining his family over Zoom for dinner and gift opening. We are a first time aunt and uncle ourselves, and we have yet to meet the precious bundle of joy. She is now nine months old. We had hoped to visit earlier this year, but I got sick the week she was born, and then lockdown happened the next time we thought we would be visiting. I am planning a time capsule memory box for her, and I took a photo of our first Facetime since that was the first time we met her.
So, maybe this year will be to the children of today like Christmas 1983 was to me -- different, and it is my most vivid memory of childhood Christmas because it doesn't blur together like so many other of the holidays do. I even remember I got a toy Adam "computer" that year. (It would play Colecovision games and had a cassette of a Buck Rogers game that came in the package.)
My goldfish survived the night, and for whatever reason, my mother always read a lot of books where people died. One of the books she gave me for Christmas was about a girl whose brother died. I read it over the next few days, and had already cried enough knowing my goldfish wasn't going to live much longer that I didn't shed any tears when my fish died at age 2 years, 3 months.
Christmas 1983 wasn't what anyone would have asked for, but I will always remember it as one of my favorite Christmases.
