The Ghost Of Christmas Past

Every Christmas I get nostalgic. When I worked at the London Coffee House, I spent Christmas Day assisting Elizabeth by shoveling snow and making coffee and handing out gifts to the clients and then staying after to help her clean up. When everything was done, we’d wish each other a Merry Christmas and go our separate ways for another year.

My memories of Christmas always involve remembrances of childhood, also. In the late fifties, in Port Wallace, Nova Scotia, when my sisters Olive, two years older, and Agnes, two years younger, and I, aged four, still lived at home with our older siblings and Dad, we had a number of Christmas traditions. For weeks leading up to the big day, we would each cut pictures of Santa out of the newspaper and tack them in a stack to the kitchen wall. It was a contest to see who could get the most pictures. Then the house would be decorated with ceiling streamers, and garland.

When time came to write our letter to Santa, we would gather at the kitchen table and go through the Sears Wish Book. My sister Agnes was famous for threatening to kick the butt of a blow-up punching bag she saw in the catalogue one year. She cracked everyone up. When Dad wrote the letter, he asked each of us what we wanted from Santa, then placed it in an envelope addressed to Santa at the North Pole. Then we all gathered to witness the letter being placed in the oven. We retreated to the upstairs and listened quietly for any sound that could be an elf coming for the letter. After several minutes someone would hear something, and we would all rush downstairs to the kitchen. We were always amazed when we opened the oven and the envelope was gone.

During the week before Christmas we cut down a tree and erected it in our living room. It was not decorated, but securely placed where it would stand for the holiday. On Christmas Eve, we would all have a meal together and we kids would be sent off to bed early. Sleep came hard that night but eventually we did drop off despite our nervous anticipation of what was to come.

Early the next morning, whichever young one woke first would wake the other two then Olive, Agnes, and I would go wake Dad and our siblings. We could barely contain ourselves when Dad made us wait at the top of the stairs while he went down first to see if Santa had been there. When he called up to tell us Santa had come, we rushed down the stairs into the living room. The tree was fully decorated with ornaments, garland, tinsel and lights. Under the lower branches and around the bottom were colourfully wrapped presents for everyone. Santa had not only come with toys and gifts but had decorated the tree. I would go straight for my six guns and cowboy hat: Olive and Agnes for their big, beautiful dolls. There was a lot of talking and laughter and our siblings would examine our toys with us and make us feel important. We also had stockings which were stuffed with candy, apples and/or oranges and, for me, a small piece of coal to remind me Santa knew I had been mischievous during the year.

The day was spent playing games, over-eating candy, and a big family dinner. Sometime during the afternoon, the adults would nod off for a nap in a chair or on the sofa. There was no time limit on us on Christmas day. We could stay up ’til we started to fall asleep.

It seems so wonderful now, in memory. These days Christmas is like any other day for me. I don’t visit with family or have family visit me. Elizabeth is no longer at the coffee house and neither am I. It is run by the CMHA now. But somehow, when I remember being a kid and racing down the stairs to see our living room lit up and decorated or remembering the smile on a homeless person’s face when I handed them a wrapped gift on Christmas Day, it is Christmas.