Christmas Past
A Christmas Poem by Carice Williams

Each Christmas I remember
The ones of long ago;
I see our mantelpiece adorned
With stockings in a row.

Each Christmas finds me dreaming
Of days that used to be,
When we hid presents here and there,
For all the family.

Each Christmas I remember
The fragrance in the air,
Of roasting turkey and mince pies
And cookies everywhere.

Each Christmas finds me longing
For Christmases now past,
And I am back in childhood
As long as memories last.

IF MY BODY WERE A CAR...

If my body were a car, this is the time I would be thinking about trading it in for a newer model. I've got bumps and dents and scratches in my finish and my paint job is getting a little dull ... But that's not the worst of it.

My headlights are out of focus and it's especially hard to see things up close.

My traction is not as graceful as it once was. I slip and slide and skid and bump into things even in the best of weather.

My whitewalls are stained with varicose veins.

It takes me hours to reach my maximum speed. My fuel rate burns inefficiently.

But here's the worst of it --

Almost every time I sneeze, cough or laugh.....

either my radiator leaks or my exhaust backfires  
 

[/

...

                                             THE LITTLE HOUSE BEHIND THE HOUSE

THE LITTLE HOUSE BEHIND THE HOUSE

One of my bygone recollections,
As I recall the days of yore.
Is the little house, behind the house,
With the crescent over the door.

'Twas a place to sit and ponder
With your head bowed down low;
Knowing that you wouldn't be there,
If you didn't have to go.

Ours was a three-holer,
With a size for every one.
You left there feeling better,
After your usual job was done.

You had to make these frequent trips,
Whether snow, rain, sleet, or fog,
To the little house where you usually
Found the Sears-Roebuck catalog.

Oft times in dead of winter,
The seat was covered with snow.
'Twas then with much reluctance,
To the little house you'd go.

With a swish you'd clear the seat,
Bend low, with dreadful fear.
You'd blink your eyes and grit your teeth
As you settled on your rear.

I recall the day Granddad,
Who stayed with us one summer,
Made a trip to the shanty
Which proved to be a hummer.

'Twas the same day my Dad
Finished painting the kitchen green.
He'd just cleaned up the mess he's made
With rags and gasoline.

He tossed the rags in the shanty hole
And went on his usual way,
Not knowing that by doing so,
He would eventually rue the day.

Now Granddad had an urgent call,
I never will forget!
This trip he made to the little house
Lingers in my memory yet.

He sat down on the shanty seat,
With both feet on the floor.
Then filled his pipe with tobacco
And struck a match on the outhouse door.

After the Tobacco began to glow,
He slowly raised his rear:
Tossed flaming match in the open hole,
With not a sign of fear.

The Blast that followed, I am sure,
Was heard for miles around;
And left poor grandpa
Just sitting on the ground.

The smoldering pipe was still in his mouth,
His suspenders he held tight;
The celebrated three-holer
Was blown clear out of sight.

When we asked him what had happened,
His answer I'll never forget.
He thought it must be something
That he had recently et!

Next day we had a new one,
Which my Dad built with ease.
With a sign on the entrance door
Which read: No Smoking, Please!

Now that's the end of the story,
With memories of long ago,
Of the little house behind the house
Where we went when we had to go!
 

Build fire in backyard to heat kettle of rain water. Set tubs so smoke wont blow in eyes if wind is pert. Shave one hole cake of lie soap in boilin water.
 
 
 
Sort things, make 3 piles
 
 
 
1 pile white,
 
 
 
1 pile colored,
 
 
 
1 pile work britches and rags.
 
To make starch, stir flour in cool water to smooth, then thin down with boiling water.
 
Take white things, rub dirty spots on board, scrub hard, and boil, then rub colored don't boil just wrench and starch.
 
Take things out of kettle with broom stick handle, then wrench, and starch.
 
Hang old rags on fence.
 
Spread tea towels on grass.
 
Pore wrench water in flower bed. Scrub porch with hot soapy water.
 
Turn tubs upside down.
 
Go put on clean dress, smooth hair with hair combs. Brew cup of tea, sit and rock a spell and count your blessings.
 

When I was quite young, my father had one of the first telephones in our neighborhood. I remember the polished, old case fastened to the wall. The shiny receiver hung on the side of the box. I was too little to reach the telephone, but used to listen with fascination when my mother talked to it.

Then I discovered that somewhere inside the wonderful device lived an amazing person. Her name was 'Information Please' and there was nothing she did not know. Information Please could supply anyone's number and the correct time.

My personal experience with the genie-in-a-bottle came one day while my Mother was visiting a neighbor. Amusing myself at the tool bench in the basement, I whacked my finger with a hammer, the pain was terrible, but there seemed no point in crying because there was no one home to give sympathy.

I walked around the house sucking my throbbing finger, finally arriving at the stairway. The telephone! Quickly, I ran for the footstool in the Parlor and dragged it to the landing climbing up; I unhooked the receiver in the parlor and held it to my ear.

'Information, please,' I said into the mouthpiece just above my head. A click or two and a small clear voice spoke into my ear.

'Information.'

'I hurt my finger,' I wailed into the phone, the tears came readily enough now that I had an audience.

'Isn't your mother home?' came the question.

'Nobody's home but me,' I blubbered.

'Are you bleeding?' the voice asked.

'No,' I replied. 'I hit my finger with the hammer and it hurts.'

'Can you open the icebox?' she asked.

I said I could.

'Then chip off a little bit of ice and hold it to your finger,' said the voice.

After that, I called 'Information Please' for everything. I asked her for help with my geography, and she told me where Philadelphia was. She helped me with my math. She told me my pet chipmunk that I had caught in the park just the day before, would eat fruit and nuts.

Then, there was the time Petey, our pet canary, died. I called, 'Information Please,' and told her the sad story. She listened, and then said things grown-ups say to soothe a child. But I was not consoled. I asked her, 'Why is it that birds should sing so beautifully and bring Joy to all families, only to end up as a heap of feathers on the bottom of a cage?'

She must have sensed my deep concern, for she said quietly, ' Wayne , always remember that there are other worlds to sing in.'

Somehow I felt better.

Another day I was on the telephone, 'Information Please.'

'Information,' said in the now familiar voice.

'How do I spell fix?' I asked.

All this took place in a small town in the Pacific Northwest. When I was nine years old, we moved across the country to Boston . I missed my friend very much. 'Information Please' belonged in that old wooden box back home and I somehow never thought of trying the shiny new phone that sat on the table in the hall. As I grew into my teens, the memories of those childhood conversations never really left me.

Often, in moments of doubt and perplexity I would recall the serene sense of security I had then. I appreciated now how patient, understanding, and kind she was to have spent her time on a little boy.

A few years later, on my way west to college, my plane put down in Seattle I had about a half-hour or so between planes. I spent 15 minutes or so on the phone with my sister, who lived there now. Then without thinking what I was doing, I dialed my hometown Operator and said, 'Information Please.'

Miraculously, I heard the small, clear voice I knew so well. 'Information.'

I hadn't planned this, but I heard myself saying, 'Could you please tell me how to spell fix?'

There was a long pause. Then came the soft spoken answer, 'I guess your finger must have healed by now.'

I laughed, 'So it's really you,' I said. 'I wonder if you have any idea how much you meant to me during that time?'

'I wonder,' she said, 'if you know how much your call meant to me. I never had any children and I used to look forward to your calls.'

I told her how often I had thought of her over the years and I asked if I could call her again when I came back to visit my sister.

'Please do,' she said. 'Just ask for Sally.'

Three months later I was back in Seattle a different voice answered: Information.' I asked for Sally.

'Are you a friend?' she said.

'Yes, a very old friend,' I answered.

'I'm sorry to have to tell you this,' she said. 'Sally had been working part-time the last few years because she was sick. She died five weeks ago.'

Before I could hang up she said, 'Wait a minute, did you say your name was Wayne ?'

'Yes.' I answered.

'Well, Sally left a message for you. She wrote it down in case you called. Let me read it to you.' The note said, 'Tell him there are other worlds to sing in. He'll know what I mean.'

I thanked her and hung up. I knew what Sally meant.

Never underestimate the impression you may make on others.

Whose life have you touched today?

Anonymous

 
Step back in time to days gone by,
when we didn't wonder the where or the why.
Sitting in a swing savoring the day,
children enjoying the sun as they would play.

Daily life was much simpler then,
if we could just return to that peace once again.
Families gathered over the weekends,
quality times shared with loved ones and friends.

Knowing folks in the neighborhood,
stopping to trade small talk and feeling really good.
Greeted by smiles or nods of the head,
sleeping that night feeling comfortable in your bed.

Leaving a window open for fresh air,
forgetting to lock any of your doors without a care.
So much tranquility is now gone forever,
replaced by increasingly bad times and foul weather.

Leisurely quiet walks in a nice park,
couples slow dancing, by the moonlight, in the dark.
Sadly those tranquil times are all gone,
people have become so lonely, scared and withdrawn.

Today things are being done wrong,
too many people don't even bother trying to get along.
Walking the street with their heads down,
gone are the friendly smiles, now replaced by a frown.

Faces are sometimes filled with fear,
always on the alert if any stranger should come near.
Afraid to reach out and lend a helping hand,
what has happened to our nations, I do not understand.

How I miss those days gone by,
pleasant memories lasting today are in short supply.
How I wish we could return once again,
when everyone always stood by you until the very end.

 
љ Brenda Sparkman

A mouse looked through the crack in the wall to see the farmer and his wife open a package.

"What food might this contain?" The mouse wondered - he was devastated to discover it was a mousetrap. Retreating to the farmyard, the mouse proclaimed the warning.. "There is a mousetrap in the house! There is a mousetrap in the house!" The chicken clucked and scratched, raised her head and said, "Mr. Mouse, I can tell this is a grave concern to you, but it is of no consequence to me...I cannot be bothered by it."

The mouse turned to the pig and told him, "There is a mousetrap in the house! There is a mousetrap in the house! "The pig sympathized, but said, "I am so very sorry, Mr. Mouse, but there is nothing I can do about it but pray. Be assured you are in my prayers."

The mouse turned to the cow and said "There is a mousetrap in the house! There is a mousetrap in the house! "The cow said, "Wow, Mr. Mouse. I'm sorry for you, but it's no skin off my nose." So, the mouse returned to the house, head down and dejected, to face the farmer's mousetrap alone. That very night a sound was heard throughout the house — like the sound of a mousetrap catching its prey. The farmer's wife rushed to see what was caught;

In the darkness, she did not see it was a venomous snake whose tail the trap had caught. The snake bit the farmer's wife. The farmer rushed her to the hospital, and she returned home with a fever. Everyone knows you treat a fever with fresh chicken soup, so the farmer took his hatchet to the farmyard for the soup's main ingredient. But his wife's sickness continued, so friends and neighbors came to sit with her around the clock. To feed them, the farmer butchered the pig. The farmer's wife did not get well; she died. So many people came for the funeral, the farmer had the cow slaughtered to provide enough meat for all of them. The mouse looked upon it all from his crack in the wall with great sadness. So, the next time you hear someone is facing a problem and think it doesn't concern remember ~ when one of us is threatened, we are all at risk.

We are all involved in this journey called life. We must keep an eye out for one another and make an extra effort to encourage one another.

REMEMBER: EACH OF US IS A VITAL THREAD IN ANOTHER PERSON'S TAPESTRY; OUR LIVES ARE WOVEN TOGETHER FOR A REASON.

One of the best things to hold onto in this world is a "friend."

Close your eyes...And go back in time
Before semi automatics and crack...
Before SEGA or Super Nintendo...
 
Way back...I'm talking about
Hide and seek at dusk.
Red light, green light.
The corner store.
Hopscotch, butterscotch, doubledutch,
jacks, kickball, dodgeball.
Mother May I...
Red Rover and Roly Poly.
Hula Hoops.
Running through the sprinkler.
An ice cream cone on a warm summer night...
Chocolate or vanilla or strawberry or
maybe butter pecan.
 
Wait...
Watching Saturday Morning cartoons...
Short commercials.
Fat Albert, Road Runner, The Three Stooges, and Bugs.
Or back further...
When around the corner seemed far away,
And going downtown seemed like going somewhere.
Cops and Robbers, Cowboys and Indians, Zorro.
Climbing trees, building igloos out of snow banks
Running till you were out of breath.
Laughing so hard that your stomach hurt.
Jumping on the bed.
Pillow fights.
Spinning around, getting dizzy, and falling down...
Being tired from playing...Remember that?
The worst embarrassment was being picked last for a team.
War was a card game.
Water balloons were the ultimate weapon.
Baseball cards in the spokes transformed any bike
into a motorcycle.
 
I'm not finished just yet...
When you'd reach into a muddy gutter for a penny.
When you got your windshield cleaned, oil checked,
and gas pumped without asking, for free, every time...
and, you didn't pay for air.
When nearly everyone's mom was at home
when the kids got there.
When it took five minutes for the TV to warm up,
if you even had one.
It was magic when dad would "remove" his thumb.
When it was considered a great privilege to be taken
out to dinner at a real restaurant with your parents.
When girls neither dated nor kissed
until late high school, if then.
 
When they threatened to keep kids back a grade
if they failed...and did!
When being sent to the principal's office was nothing compared to the fate that awaited
a misbehaving student at home.
Basically, we were in fear for our lives but it wasn't
because of drive-by shootings, drugs, gangs, etc.
Our parents and grandparents were a much bigger threat!
Didn't that feel good? Just to go back and say,
"Yeah, I remember that!"

Close your eyes...And go back in time
Before semi automatics and crack...
Before SEGA or Super Nintendo...
 
Way back...I'm talking about
Hide and seek at dusk.
Red light, green light.
The corner store.
Hopscotch, butterscotch, doubledutch,
jacks, kickball, dodgeball.
Mother May I...
Red Rover and Roly Poly.
Hula Hoops.
Running through the sprinkler.
An ice cream cone on a warm summer night...
Chocolate or vanilla or strawberry or
maybe butter pecan.
 
Wait...
Watching Saturday Morning cartoons...
Short commercials.
Fat Albert, Road Runner, The Three Stooges, and Bugs.
Or back further...
When around the corner seemed far away,
And going downtown seemed like going somewhere.
Cops and Robbers, Cowboys and Indians, Zorro.
Climbing trees, building igloos out of snow banks
Running till you were out of breath.
Laughing so hard that your stomach hurt.
Jumping on the bed.
Pillow fights.
Spinning around, getting dizzy, and falling down...
Being tired from playing...Remember that?
The worst embarrassment was being picked last for a team.
War was a card game.
Water balloons were the ultimate weapon.
Baseball cards in the spokes transformed any bike
into a motorcycle.
 
I'm not finished just yet...
When you'd reach into a muddy gutter for a penny.
When you got your windshield cleaned, oil checked,
and gas pumped without asking, for free, every time...
and, you didn't pay for air.
When nearly everyone's mom was at home
when the kids got there.
When it took five minutes for the TV to warm up,
if you even had one.
It was magic when dad would "remove" his thumb.
When it was considered a great privilege to be taken
out to dinner at a real restaurant with your parents.
When girls neither dated nor kissed
until late high school, if then.
 
When they threatened to keep kids back a grade
if they failed...and did!
When being sent to the principal's office was nothing compared to the fate that awaited
a misbehaving student at home.
Basically, we were in fear for our lives but it wasn't
because of drive-by shootings, drugs, gangs, etc.
Our parents and grandparents were a much bigger threat!
Didn't that feel good? Just to go back and say,
"Yeah, I remember that!"

Remember when...
Decisions were made by going "eeny-meeny-miney-mo."
Mistakes were corrected by simply exclaiming, "Do over!"
"Race issue" meant arguing about who ran the fastest.
The worst thing you could catch
from the opposite sex was cooties.
It was unbelievable that dodgeball wasn't an Olympic event.
Having a weapon in school meant being caught with a slingshot.
Scrapes and bruises were kissed and made better.
Taking drugs meant orange-flavored chewable aspirin.
Abilities were discovered because of a "double-dog-dare."

If you can remember most or all of these,
then you have LIVED!!!
Pass this on to anyone who may need a break from "grown up" life...
I DOUBLE DOG DARE YA!!! 

[from an e-mail received from a friend in Australia]

  A child was told to write a book report on the entire Bible. This is amazing and brought tears to my eyes. I wonder how often we take for granted that children understand what we are teaching??? Through the eyes of a child. Children’s Bible in a Nutshell In the beginning, which occurred near the start, there was nothing but God, darkness, and some gas. The Bible says, ’The Lord thy God is one, but I think He must be a lot older than that. Anyway, God said, ’Give me a light!’ and someone did. Then God made the world. He split the Adam and made Eve. Adam and Eve were naked, but they weren’t embarrassed because mirrors hadn’t been invented yet. Adam and Eve disobeyed God by eating one bad apple, so they were driven from the Garden of Eden. Not sure what they were driven in though, because they didn’t have cars. Adam and Eve had a son, Cain, who hated his brother as long as he Was Abel.Pretty soon all of the early people died off, except for Methuselah, who lived to be like a million or something. One of the next important people was Noah, who was a good guy, but one Of his kids was kind of a Ham. Noah built a

boat and put his family and some animals on it. He asked some other people to join him, but they said they would have to take a rain check After Noah came Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Jacob was more famous than His brother, Esau, because Esau sold Jacob his birthmark in exchange for some pot roast. Jacob had a son named Joseph who wore a really loud sports coat. Another important Bible guy is Moses, whose real name was Charlton Heston. Moses led the Israel Lights out of Egypt and away from the evil Pharaoh after God sent ten plagues on Pharaoh’s people. These plagues included frogs, mice, lice, bowels, and no cable. God fed the Israel Lights every day with manicotti. Then he gave them His Top ten Commandments. These include don’t lie, cheat, smoke, dance, or covet your neighbor’s stuff. Oh, yeah, I just thought of one more: Humor thy father and thy mother. One of Moses’ best helpers was Joshua who was the first Bible guy to Use spies. Joshua fought the battle of Geritol and the fence fell over on the town. After Joshua came David. He got to be king by killing a giant with A slingshot. He had a son named Solomon who had about 300 wives and 500 porcupines. My teacher says he was wise, but that doesn’t sound very wise to me After Solomon there were a bunch of major league prophets. One of These was Jonah, who was swallowed by a big whale and then barfed upon the shore. There were also some minor league prophets, but I guess we don’t have to worry about them. After the Old Testament came the New Testament. Jesus is the star of The New Testament. He was born in Bethlehem in a barn. (I wish I had been born in a barn, too, because my mom is always saying to me, ’Close the door! Were you born in a barn?’ It would be nice to say, ’As a matter of fact, I was.’) During His life, Jesus had many arguments with sinners like the Pharisees and the Republicans. Jesus also had twelve opossums. The worst one was Judas Asparagus. Judas was so evil that they named a terrible vegetable after him. Jesus was a great man. He healed many leopards and even preached to Some Germans on the Mount. But the Republicans and all those guys put Jesus on trial before Pontius the Pilot. Pilot didn’t stick up for Jesus. He just washed his hands instead. Any way’s, Jesus died for our sins, then came back to life again. He Went up to Heaven but will be back at the end of the Aluminum. His return is foretold in the book of Revolution.