Classic Christmas Stories by Frank Galgay

of
     complete exhaustion. I’ll never forget the dreadful day when just as the three
     men were sitting around the table with glasses raised, the room thick with
     smoke, the door opened and my great-aunt came back for the glove she had
     forgotten.
    Three jaws dropped when she came into the room, and it’s a
     lucky thing the glasses didn’t as well, for they were our best ones. Everybody
     started to talk at once but the old lady saved the situation by saying, with a
     twinkle in her frosty blue eyes “You might offer me one, boys.” We always
     considered it fortunate that the other aged relative had stayed behind at my
     cousins’ house. It would have been too sad for her to find that her years of
     quoting temperance poetry had had so little effect on the men of our
     family.
    Of course, all our memories are not happy ones. I think of Christmas during the
     war, when black-out curtains hid gay Christmas lights and sad news from overseas
     dampened the brightest spirits. There was one Christmas Day when my sailor
     cousin, who had lived with us, was missing, and although we all tried to
     maintain a cheerful demeanour, the atmosphere was strained and tense. In fact,
     we were all glad when it was over. A few nights later, however, we heard a
     familiar step in the hallway, and we all ran out to see a tired-eyed but smiling
     young man, clad in sneakers and woollies provided by the Red Cross, standing
     there with a duffle-bag in his hand. There was wild rejoicing that night, and
     the next day we celebrated Christmas as it had been impossible to do on the
     twenty-fifth. We learned that my cousin’s ship had been torpedoed on his
     birthday, December 16th, and he had swum for hours in icy waters before being
     rescued. His Christmas dinner, eaten on board the rescue ship, had consisted of
     beef and potatoes but we made sure that a feast of fat things was set before him
     the day after his arrival. That, I think, was our most thankful Christmas.
    Now I must get back to hanging my Christmas decorations. But you may be sure
     that, glittering and gorgeous as they may be, nothing will mean quite as much to
     me as the bouquet of Christmas memories that exists in my heart. I feel sure
     there’s one in yours, too.

Looking Back at Christmas 50 Years Ago
    by Kevin Jardine
    W
ATER STREET IS SPARKLING in the early dark. People are
     hurrying to and fro and everywhere there is a feeling of excitement. The horses
     with their bells seem to add to the harmony of the cold frosty day. Underfoot,
     the snow is crunching and people remark, “hear the snow crunching, a sure sign
     of a frosty night.”
    Many of the larger stores are particularly bright, and this is due to the fact
     that the bulbs they use are much more powerful than what they usually carry.
     Those bulbs will be stored away again when the New Year is over. The stores were
     not as well-heated in those days as they are now. The windows would be coated
     over but each had its electric fan which will enable the would-be purchaser to
     make a choice.
    Going back, it would seem that our weather changed a lot after the Burin tidal
     wave. There is no doubt that the winters are shorter. I remember quite well that
     in the month of November the Catholic Church bell would toll during that month
     of the holy souls. The bell tolled to remind us to offer our prayers for those
     that had departed. We were allowed out until 9 o’clock Friday nights, but had to
     hurry home for that prayer. We usually brought out our sled in late October. The
     streets wouldbe well coated with snow and frost at that time.
     Skating officially started at Christmas, and it was a great disappointment if
     the ponds or lakes were not frozen over for Christmas day.
    The homes also were not as well-heated, and many of the windows would have what
     we called Jack Frost on them. What the people today are missing there also are
     the beautiful patterns. And if you wanted to see what it was like