I GOT A BESTIE FOR CHRISTMAS
Pen pal letter # 11
# 11……………….I am so full of Christmas cheer. I have a brand new best friend for Christmas. Read my (James Edward Young) penpal letter to Love
Good morning Genevieve,
I want to step back and be objective. I like the name Genevieve. I’ve never known a Genevieve. You are the first. Saying your name sounds like a leaf breaking loose from its branch and gracefully floating to earth. ”Gen” is the leaf breaking loose, and “evieve”, being softer, is like the leaf taking it’s time floating down. I’m a poet, what can I say ?
You’re the first person to ever ask me to talk of my past Christmases . You think of the most interesting projects for us to write about. I like the way you are guiding me. I like the way you inspire me. Yes I’d love to tell you about some of the best Christmases that I’ve ever had.
My first story is more about my Dad than me. Dad dressed up as Santa Claus to a whole bunch of kids. I think I was four years old. Dad looked really good as Santa Claus. His outfit was great and when he smiled, his whole whole face lit up and he had really pretty bright blue eyes that sparkled. What a beautiful memory I have of my Dad. I watched all the kids climb up on his lap and say what they wanted for Christmas. Then it got to be my turn to climb up on Santa’s lap and when he talked to me, I begin to think there’s something familiar about Santa’s voice. Then I was sure of it. I said loudly,” hey, you’re not Santa Claus. You are my Dad.” He pretended to be indignant and declared that “Well I am so Santa Claus”, but the more he talked, the more convinced I was that he was my Dad and he was pulling a scam on me. I’m pretty sure I quickly forgave Dad, because I got “stuff” and my attention was quickly diverted by candy.
When I was 12, Christmas was magic. I still remember that wonderful “Christmasy feeling”. Playing with friends was different. We all had an agenda. I felt like Ralphie in the movie A Christmas Story. If you’ve never watched a Christmas story, you owe it to yourself because it’s the warmest happiest Christmas comedy ever made. It so captured what it was like for me when I was 10. I remember my friend Bill got a new Schwinn bike with springs on the front forks. I think it had a light and a horn too. I got a chemistry set and that was a big mistake.The adults around me should have known. They should have known, but they didn’t . I have a knack for getting into trouble and a chemistry set only got me started. I played with all the chemicals in my chemistry set but I knew things, things I should not know. I always was mixing this and that together just to see what would happen. Did you know that if you burned sulfur and charcoal and sugar together, it burns beautiful blue ? We had a swimming pool and Dad would put chemicals in it to keep it clean. I liked those chemicals because they were dangerous. Chlorine and acid is deadly, but I didn’t realize it at the time. I even had a cyanide jar for killing bugs for my collection. OMG, I’m glad I didn’t pour acid on that . We had a tool room where all kinds of chemicals were stored. Chemicals necessary to run a household. Muriatic acid, black flag concentrated pesticide syrup, rat poison grain saturated with Paris green(poison), garden sulfur and gasoline. Dad had a shotgun, so naturally I opened up the shells and put gunpowder into the mixture. What kid wouldn’t. When you’re a kid and they just let you out of school for Christmas you can do all sorts of things you should not do. You just need to remember to keep your mouth shut and don’t get cought. Getting cought for some stupid little kid crime is bad just before Christmas . I repeat, just don’t get caught. I would get into the tool room and mix up my Devils cocktail . I was on Christmas break when I showed all my friends what I made . We would go around and pour stuff like that on anthills just to see what would happen. I always tried to impress my friends which often got me in trouble.( That very same tendency continues to this day) We never got hurt playing with dad’s chemicals. We never got hurt playing with Dad’s chemicals. We never got hu………oh.
Well, I’m still standing ain’t I, so ha ha ………I remember when I was 12, I was a safety patrol boy and I got free pass to all the movies. Right next door to the movie theater that I like to go to, was a store called Frank’s novelties. There were things in there that that I probably wasn’t supposed to see but it was okay because Mom and Dad were not around. I remember buying a pooh-pooh cushion that would make farting noises. Christmas Eve was coming and everybody was coming to our house. I looked forward, through the pine smells and Christmas lights and hard candies, to someone sitting on “the chair” that had the poo poo cushion. My sister Pat sat on it and outrageous noises poured forth. I rolled in hysterics on the floor…She denied culpability, but everyone knew (te he) , that she had to be lieing.
Everyone knows that farters lie about that.
After Christmas each year, when people were done with their trees, we drug as many trees as we could find into a vacant lot. We had lots of vacant lots. We would make a fort or two and have wars by heaving weeds torn out of the ground that still had a big wet dirt clod on the end. What a great grenade to hit your friend in the head with. No damage was done because kids are basically brain dead anyway . by the time we were battle weary, we lit our forts on fire. Watching 50 dry Christmas trees burn is truly impressive. I would venture a guess that the flames rose to about 100 feet. Try that now and they will take you to “juvie”. Don’t ask me about “juvie”. LOL.
When I was 18, I was so in love with my brand new girlfriend. My sister Pat sewed her a top that I could give her for Christmas. Being that it was Christmas and I was on cloud nine in love, and on top of that I was full of the Christmas spirit, I sure wish I had stored some of that ambrosia in a jar for later. I literally felt like I was floating on air every second . . I will never forget how I felt all the time. Too bad it didn’t last .
Christmas with Joan has been wonderful because at Christmas time Joan always has the mind of a child and it’s contagious because so do I . We buy each other silly useful gifts. I like to buy her a little bit of jewelry. I’m not rich and it’s nothing expensive. I think it’s fun if it’s kind of funny or personal. I bought her a pair of unicorn skeleton earrings and a fidget ring. She bought me a official garage sale inspector badge and a neat hat band for my cowboy hat . We keep a thousand yards away from relatives because we want to continue to love them . I don’t know why it is that families love to fight when they get together at Christmas time and I don’t want to have any part of that. It hurts . We made it policy to always do Christmas by ourselves. We always enjoy doing everything by ourselves with no outside interference. We been together 24 seven 365 for a little while. Whoa, I did the math really quick. Forget about that. It’s a long while . HA HA HA HA.
I have the strong desire to buy a little bottle of bourbon and some food and $20 and give it to a homeless guy for Christmas.
I don’t know why I want to do that, I just do. I’m not trying to be some kind of hero, he is just my unlucky brother that might appreciate some Christmas love.
I want to end this like this. Just, thank you Love for being my friend. I love everybody in my world more than I can say. But, somehow I really needed more. I really needed this friendship, Love. Without sounding corney,
I don’t have a ton of friends and only a select few are “forever friends” . I hope you will be my “forever friend” forever. I hope you and your guy have a Christmas equalling how great I feel at this moment . I got my best girl, Joan and I got her fooled into loving me . Merry Christmas Love. Yes, that’s what I said……………… Merry Christmas.
