CHRISTMAS 1992

         The current sick economy brings back memories of my childhood during the Great Depression (they called it as they saw it them, not as now, a "prolonged recession"). Dad was in the construction industry which shut down around the first of November for the winter season, to open up again around the first of March when times were good; the only difference during bad times was that there was no real resumption of work in March. This made for a rather bleak Christmas, at least from the adult point of view. Not so for me. We would usually visit my Chicago grandparents and a host of other relatives on the 24th, 25th and 26th of December. I would watch the process of putting up the tree on the 24th. This started with Uncle George going to a nearby tree lot and asking for an arm load of tree branches that were trimmed away at the request of paying customers. He brought these home and carefully laid them out on the dining room table. Next I accompanied his to his tiny workshop in the garage for some pieces of 1/4, a broom stick and a few tools: a hammer, some nails and a brace and a quarter inch bit. First he drilled a large number of holes at many spots along the length and aound the circumference of the broom stick. Next he made a cross out of the 1/4's and nailed the broom stick to them so it would be vertical at the center when the cross was lying on the floor. Then he got out his pocket knife and whittled the large ends of the tree branches to a bit larger than one quarter inch diameter. The final operation as to press the end of a branch into a drilled hole, the longest branches into the holes at the lowest points on the broom stick. The choice of which branch to put into which hole was a family decision, sometimes resulting in disagreement that was settled by an arbitrary decision by Grandma. As the tree developed there were comments like, "This is going to be the best one ever", and "This one is more perfectly shaped than even the most expensive one on the tree lot". I think that I was pretty well grown up before I realized that my family's approach to putting up the Christmas tree was done out of economic necessity rather than to perpetuate an old family custom brought over from Europe. With lights, tinsel and ornaments added it really was a most attractive tree.

         Christmas day was spent in visiting many Chicago relatives. One memory that stands out was our visit to the Peseks. They had a tree with THREE strings of lights, each string having 8 lights, and these were electrically in series so if one light burned out the whole string went dark. Cousins Dorothy and Honey had developed a great game around this fact: the person who was "it" would remain at the tree while the rest of us would go into another room, out of sight of the tree. The "it" person would then proceed to unscrew one bulb from each string, making the tree dark. Upon returning we would take turns, one guess each, as to which bulb was unscrewed. If you guessed correctly a string would be lighted and you could continue with a second guess. An adult would help the smaller kids who otherwise would not be able to reach into the upper tree branches. The game was not without its tearful moments: an older child would watch the expression on the face of a young one who was "it" for visual clues while approaching a particular light. It was easy for the older one to make three correct guesses and turn the gleeful cries for stumping the older ones into tears. The adults finally intervened and added a rule to prevent this: you could not watch the face of the young one while making up your mind on which bulb was unscrewed.

         The highlight of the visit was the day after Christmas. Aunt Alvena would take me in tow. Grandma would provide a quarter plus carfare. "Crouch down", she would say, "and I will tell the conductor that you are big for your age and are still under five years old; then you'll have another nickel to spend." "Lady", the conductor once said, "that kid is at least 8 years old; if this weren't the Christmas season I wouldn't let him on this car without your paying his fare." We would take the streetcar to Wieboldts Department Store. On one of the floors that had been devoted to toys up to two days before now had a huge table heaped with toys that had been damaged by the shoppers. Above the table was a large sign announcing "No toy over 25 cents". It seemed to me that there were thousands of toys and I could choose one or more depending on their prices! I remember one year choosing a ukulele that had all its strings broken.

         Aunt Vene also had other gifts for me: cigar boxes from the cigar store next to their tailor shop (then all cigar boxes with one exception were made out of beautiful mahogany with the exception was the White Owl cigar box which was made of cardboard -- it made me angry that men would buy White Owl cigars), swaths of cloth from obsolete tailor's sample books and Kraft cheese boxes that were made of nicely sanded sugar pine. But the best gift was from Uncle George. He worked for the Bally Manufacturing Company which then made mostly pin ball machines. Uncle George would scourer their garbage cans for GOOD THINGS dropped on the floor and swept up with the metal and wood shavings. These included screws, small nuts and bolts, solenoids, resistors, relays, insulated wire, and small light bulbs and matching sockets. All this would be given to me wrapped in a paper sack bound carefully with string. I always knew that his would be my best gift. When compared to Uncle George's gift, mom and dad's gifts of new socks and underwear were little appreciated. Mom never understood why.

Jim (aka "Fat")