Childhood Christmas Revisited

So i’m one day into being 40. Fuck I’m old. lol. I was thinking earlier while STILL sitting here watching A Christmas Story over and over and….well….So yeah I was thinking about what it was like when i was around 7 or 8. Waking up early at first light to raid my parents room and wake them up so I could open presents. I mean as kids Christmas just wasn’t Christmas unless there was tons of torn paper, ribbons and bows all over the place. I was kind of odd. I always well most of the time kept the bigger present until last. Or maybe they made me wait til last. I forget that far back but I remember opening the first present to find socks. Whoa man new socks! Kinda funny how as kids we threw clothes off to the side awaiting some awesome ass toy. lol. Then the next present and whoa a toy. It was Capsela I think it was called. Basically sort of a newer version of the Erector set. It was these bubble looking pieces that you connected together and ran on batteries and you could make moving stuff. Came with wheels and all. Ill post pics at the end. I found it on Google lol. I remember that was one of the coolest damn toys. I’d hook up those things and make absolutely nothing but it looked cool! THEN……and then oooooh man i’d leave pieces on the floor and step on it. Firstly…..OUCH!!! Then……FUUUUUUCK I just broke an important piece. lol. Besides Capsela though I also loved getting Legos. Oh man i’d make all kinds of shit out of Legos. Buildings, planes, cars and some whack shit I don’t even remember. Even after all that there was still more presents. See back then we didn’t have smartphones, Nintendo, PS4s, Xbox, DVD players etc. So i’d open another present. That dreaded long lightweight box. You already knew picking up that box it was either a nice dress shirt or jeans lol. Tearing it open I see that Foleys logo and whoa…..its a shirt! Thanks and all but whats in that BIG box behind the tree??? Yep as a kid you want that big box. Ill get to that big box soon.

During all the present opening chaos my dad would turn on a record of Xmas music. Usually Chipmunks cause i loved that shit. My mom would go between making breakfast and watching me tear shit open like a rabid dog. Of course as we got older there was those times you tried to be all cool and shit and be slow opening presents. OOOOOH a present let me open this slowly so I don’t look too excited lol. Yeah cmon we all been there. Then there was that time I was like Ralphie and got a BB gun and wanted to go shoot it outside at every bird I saw. It looked like an M-16. BUT I’m sure you can all remember doing the pre-christmas present shake. No its not a fucking dance…unless you danced while checking your gifts. lol. I remember going over by the tree on xmas break from school and my parents would be at work and I was over in that corner by the tree shaking the shit out of everything….Clothes….clothes…..something noisy…..something liquidy….something heavy…thats it! i want the heavy one first lol. Or there was that time you tried to tear open an corner and hope your parents didn’t notice because we was impatient and didn’t like waiting until Xmas Eve. Santa to me was just some fat make believe fucker. I knew they got up and hid shit under the tree. lol.

Then as I got older I remember we started having Christmas parties at my aunt Trini’s house. Of course we did the usual Xmas at home but there would be a few presents I’d have to wait to open until we went to the party with the entire family. My aunt at the time lived off Mayweather St in Pecan Grove. Corner house. Big yard. My aunt Trini always goes all out. She loves decorating and doing crafty stuff. She made tons of stuff back then. So it was fitting we went to her house. They would have tons of food. Main course and snacks, drinks…etc. She had a huge tree in the corner by a window and at the time it was really just my cousin Jason and I and a few others that were older. Jason and I would be bugging asking when is it time to open. We would be outside running around being stupid then we could go inside and sit by the tree……impatiently waiting for that moment. Then the gift giving began. Like hawks we awaited our name to be called. JASON…oh man he would tear that present open and I was like…what you get? He was like….socks and jeans. Then I got mine. Same thing….lol. Usually the bigger gifts for us were done at home. But eventually we still got some kind of toy or whatever. Then afterwards packed all that shit up and went home. Fell asleep and that was it….Xmas was over.

So yeah I didn’t forget the big box. Lets go back to that age 7 or 8. We had this 3 panel window in the front of our house. Our dinner table was right in front of it and the kitchen was right to the left of the table. Our tree was there. I think we had it in different places but for this time it was by the window. Up against the wall by the window was that big ass box. Enough already give me the damn big ass box!! LOL. Finally that moment came and my dad would give me the big ass box. You know as kids we had box awareness. We could somehow look at a box and be like, “i know that the fuck that is.” I had a good clue what it was because I had asked for it after seeing it at Wal-Mart while munching on popcorn. Back then you could walk over to the front of the store and get a bag of popcorn while you shopped. Anyways, I grabbed at corner of the paper on the box and tore that mother fucker open……ALAS!!! Present revealed! It was one of those electronic train race sets. Just like the race car sets you played with by holding the yellow or red controller and squeezing the trigger. I had gotten quite a few of these. Loved them. Except this one was a train and it had glow in the dark stickers you could put on it. That bitch was bad ass man. I wore the shit out of that thing. See on those cars/trains they had metal contacts on the bottom and the more you ran them the faster they wore out. Yep I wore them out fast. lol. So that Christmas came to an end. That present my spoiled ass wanted finally in my hands. Somehow I remember my parents buying me a blue sweater that read, “I’m a Toys R Us Kid.” lol yep Remember those cheesy Toys R Us commercials on TV where they would sing that jingle and at the end they said, “toooooooys rrrrrrrr uuuuusssssssss.” Basically hypnotizing you to buy shit from them.

So thats about it. A look back into glimpses of my childhood Christmas. Do you remember yours? Are you even actually reading this post? lol. Oh well…..as kids we always had that selfish phase where we didn’t care. We just wanted to open up our presents and we wanted toys toys toys. Now as an adult times have changed and we have smartphones and gift cards. So while your giving someone their gift card your probably making some cheesy holiday video of it. Then post christmas you realize you have 500+ pictures and 100+ videos on your phone. Waaaay too much for me. I keep my photos around 50 or so. That was life as a kid though. For many of you I went to school with or socialize with you probably have your own kids now who do the same things you did as a kid. I’m sure its funny to see it all these years later. With that final thought I leave you all with a simple wish for a Merry Christmas. Party hard…..

 

Cheers
Gill

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So This is Christmas….

Another year and another holiday has come nearly to an end. It seems as though the year was long and horrendous yet the holidays were very short and not sweet. I haven’t posted much on here lately. Just so much going on with life and living it. No more touring but now being a father figure. Thats pretty much full time shit right there.

Its been quite hard getting into any kind of Xmas spirit this year. What the hell is up with this weather? Across the USA and even across the pond the weather is hotter than normal. I mean people going to sport events in shorts and flip flops when it is normally cold as fuck this time of year. Its quite odd. On the up side its been great skydiving weather. Finally made it over 100 jumps! Much more comfortable with the sport now. Thats about the only good thing about the weather.

Its been what I consider the usual Texas style holiday though since coming back here for the week. Most people complain about how they hate the snow and I tell them “come to Texas, theres no fucking snow here just hell weather.” Its also true that the weather here changes when I come back. When I’m gone it will get cold AF. When I come back its like that fucker God says “oh hey Gill’s back lets jack up the temperature here.” Never fails. Every time I return to TX it gets hot. When I leave and I mean literally the same day I hop on the plane the weather goes back to cold. WTF. lol

So anyways like I was saying, I can’t really get into the holiday spirit. Not depressed at all. Quite happy with all the life changes and such. Its just that here no one has any Xmas spirit anymore. It seems like people are so caught up in just spending money on themselves and their cell phones that they can’t find enough time in the day to decorate for the holiday. So i was looking at pics friends sent me from where they live in England and across Europe and their communities and cities have a plethora, yes i said plethora lol, of decorations. Even my Russian friends sent me tons of pics of their city. As I type this one of my friends and his girlfriend are probably preparing for Xmas as its around 2 or 3pm there. So almost Xmas morning. So the only holiday lights we saw was driving through an old neighborhood where my friends and I used to hang out. Those white folks are family people and many of them still have Xmas spirit. One of them is pretty much the Clark W Griswold of the area. lol.

It is Christmas Eve morning and also my birthday. Felt pretty good to get some early wishes. So many forget with the holiday rush upon. Sadly, my friends remember more than family. My online friends that is! lol. I don’t really know how I feel about it anymore. Some people say suck it up and quit bitching but think about it……If your birthday is on lets say June 6 you will likely get presents and/or wishes from your peers. Presents are not ever expected by me by the way. So when Christmas rolls around you got your awesome birthday and then a nice Xmas. For me its “here’s your birthday and Xmas all in one.” It kinda sucks but oh well. Like I said so many say suck it up and get over it but why is it ok for others to get 2 holiday wishes and me/others only one? That selfishness people are saying I have kinda goes back on them right? Why be so shitty about it.

Anyways, like I say it doesn’t bother me much anymore but does make me think sometimes. For me the only presents I get and find as the best ever is my family and friends being around me year round. Having the friendships I have where I can chat with friends online or over a beer. I have so many friends I’ve never even met but consider them of the best friends. Hopefully one day be able to meet some of them. The best gifts a person can receive are not even really given. Its being surrounded by good people who support you no matter what you are dealing with in life. Right now I am dealing with kidney issues. Earlier this year I dealt with another health issue and hopefully it doesn’t come back. It kills many people every year.

The greatest gift I think I got this year and in a long time was from my friend Foster. He passed on months ago. Sadly taking his own life. Its hard to say that something good could come from something so terrible but his death did bring some good in my life. His gift to me was changing my outlook on life when it came to kids. True that I still don’t want marriage but his death made me see having children is truly a great gift. About 17 years ago he asked me if I would be a god father to his child. At the time they didn’t know if a boy or girl. They had a girl. Ive been part of her life since she was born. All her life she’s known me as “Uncle Gill.” Now with the unfortunate circumstances and not having any family alive to care for her I’ve become “dad.” Before my friend passed he had asked me something very random…..”hey man on the real if anything ever happens to me make sure you look after my little girl….you promise right?” His exact words. Of course I said yes. How could I say no? I hate to see her deal with all this pain right now. Her father’s death is still so fresh and they were not on the best of terms at that time. So the greatest gift I’ve been given is him giving me his blessing to look after his teenage daughter. She’s a smart kid. Already graduated from high school a year early and starting college very soon on a full scholarship. I can’t ever replace “Dad” but i can be a father figure that will try and guide her through life and all the difficult decisions she will face ahead. I had no idea what to give her for Christmas so I bought her $1000 worth of gift cards to use but even more special……I made a DVD of video I found of her father and I just being idiots. Jamming in his garage and chugging beers to moments when she was a kid and can’t possibly remember. After all she needs good memories of her dad and these I gathered she’s never seen. When I took her on my final tour leg she saw just how awesome of a life it can be and also how stressful. So seeing those videos on that DVD I think she will understand. From the very poor crappy cell phone videos we shot to high quality HD. I hope Christmas Day or whenever she decides to view it she will see just how great a life he had and how our friendship was.

So This is Christmas…..the lyrics to one of my favorite songs by John Lennon. For years I’ve listened and played this song on my guitar followed by Imagine also by John Lennon. To think when I was in my 20s I hated anything by Lennon. Now I cherish the great music he wrote and that music has become a huge part of me. One day when all the people who make my Christmas happy are gone Ill be sad and that song will be one that forever reminds me of them and that time of my life. After all, one day ill be gone. I just hope that people have nice things to say about me once I leave. I had a dream of my own death and visualized it. It was quite interesting as I saw some things I didn’t expect. Some who were huge parts of my life not there to celebrate my final days. Others I didn’t recognize. Possibly people i’ll meet in my future. The only part that was interesting is that visualizing it all I had no family of my own. Just friends and what family was left and a god daughter who looked at me as dad.

So yes This is Christmas……Happy New Year…….