Month: December 2025

Joyous Anticipation

~ John ~ 2 Comments

The household is all in bed now…. the Christmas tree is lit…. the smell of pine wafts through the house….the lingering smell of gingerbread cookies hangs in the air ….my faithful dog waits at the foot of my bed hoping that i will fall asleep so he can hop in with me ….the hour is late ….i lay there restless, trying to hear any sound that would suggest the arrival of Santa Claus — The floor is cold, the single coal fired heater is way out in the kitchen….I have to have extra blankets on the bed — the warmth of the dog helps too —

I have left cookies out for Santa Claus —they are gone in the morning– I am excited about that until I learned it was my Dad who ate them and not Santa — i can hear the winter wind moaning around the outside of the house …. there is snow on the ground outdoors ….the whole town seems like the proverbial “Silent Night,” — not a soul stirring, not even a mouse ….except in my room with my dog and me ….I can’t wait for morning to come ….what is under the other tree in the living room …..what is under that tree for me …. my entire body tingles with the anticipation ….will the Collins bunch show up at dinner time like always, looking for that free meal?—will my friend Jimmy Putnam come over to show me what he got for Christmas and to break at least one of my new toys? — will my Mom insist that I eat breakfast before opening my presents? —

There I lay in that bed, my childish imagination running wild …..never realizing that we were dirt poor and whatever there is under that tree cost my Dad a lot of sacrifice and hard labor — He dug graves at the cemetery for a lousy $35 dollars every two weeks —I got one pair of shoes that had to last for a year —My aunt Ella always sends me a pair of socks for Christmas …My Grandma always gets me a pair of socks for Christmas ….The kids at our Second Grade School Christmas party gave me a handkerchief —Maybe I will get a sled this year —

My dad made me a sled (of sorts) out of wood but when he was demonstrating how it worked on the snow covered cemetery hill, the runners broke and he ended up with a face full of snow and cursing like a sailor and telling me, “I will get you a real sled for Christmas.” —

My dog didn’t seem to care all that much about Christmas …every day was Christmas for him ….. as long as he got a lot of petting and sweet talk and some good dog food, he thought he was living like a king —-which he was — dog food was expensive….he ate a lot of table scraps…I ate a lot of table scraps too …they were called “Left Overs.” — but life was good … we had a roof over our head — the roof leaked sometimes — but leaky roofs are what galvanized aluminum gallon buckets and No.10 galvanized wash tubs are for —

Daddy finally was able to scrounge a few asphalt shingles to patch the roof with ….He found them discarded in the dump at the cemetery — I eventually doze off to sleep remembering the strains of the son I heard at Sunday School, “Oh Little Town Of Bethlehem.” —- Did I mention that my teacher, Nellie Vice, got me a pair of socks for Christmas?

I Went A Little Crackers On This One

~ John ~ 2 Comments

The idea is to get yourself a box of those beautiful little round crackers and put them on a microwave safe plate and cook them in the microwave on high temperature for 15 to 18 seconds (Be careful to avoid burning them).

After removing the crackers from the microwave (Be careful because the crackers and the plate will be hot.) get our some of your choice of (a) Peanut Butter, (b) Blackberry Preserves, (Or other preserves of your choice) and slather the individual crackers with your chosen topping — I even like cream cheese on mine some times—and enjoy the crackers along with some coffee or whatever drink you choose…..and you are welcome.

This has been my “Before Bed” snack for a few weeks now and I find it addictive to say the least.

A Day Of Grief And Discovery

~ John ~ 2 Comments

I thought i was a big man when I walked into Thompson’s Hardware store and bought that air rifle. Oh I was going to be the big, brave white hunter for sure. I was 17 and was feeling like a man… or so I thought.

So I took my new gun down to the creek and in no time had shot a bird out of a tree.

I went to inspect the bird and was immediately overtaken with guilt and shame.

I cried hard for a long time and became very angry with myself.

I asked God for forgiveness.

I took that new air rifle and slammed it against a big rock a few times and then threw it into the deepest pool in the creek.

I never hurt a living creature on purpose again.

My First Creamy Whip Experience

~ John ~ 2 Comments

After I had started my newspaper (See previous posts), the owner of the new Creamy Whip restaurant invited me to enjoy a special treat “On The House” prior to his taking out a full page ad in my newspaper… the first full page ad I ever sold and it paid for an entire weeks publication of the paper. I don’t remember what kind of sundae that was but it was big and it was delicious and it didn’t cost an arm and a leg either, The old man loved his restaurant, loved our town and loved kids — and, in turn, everybody loved him back. I can tell you that the sundae had chocolate incorporated liberally somewhere inside, I am a choco freak— always have been.

Something New

~ John ~ 2 Comments

I guess the year was 1955 when my Grandfather bought me my first typewriter. I placed it on the desk that my Dad had bought for me to do my school work on and began to learn how to type with one finger at a time.

I loved that old typewriter but I wasn’t allowed to do my school homework assignments on it because my teacher had demanded that all homework assignments be done in pen (Not a ballpoint pen either because she always said, “It is impossible to write with a pen.” She was talking cursive writing of course because we weren’t allowed to print our assignments either.)

But I did find uses for my typewriter. I used it to write love notes to my girlfriend. I even thought about writing a book. But the problem was that it took me about an hour and a half to finish and entire 8-1/2 x 11-inch sheet of typing paper.

But within a few months of getting the typewriter, I happened to notice an old mimeograph printing machine in the basement of a local grocery store owned by a friend of mine and he told me that I could play with it.

I learned to type on stencils that the mimeograph machine used and did a mock up of a one sides, one page newspaper.

The store owner was impressed and told me, “If you will put the advertisement for my store on one side of that newspaper of yours, I will buy the paper, the ink and the stencils for the mimeograph machine and I will put one of them into each bag of groceries i sell. People will enjoy reading the little news articles.

I offered my friend a better deal. I told him, “If you will do all that and pay me a penny apiece for walking all over town putting these papers into door handles, I will distribute them for you to every house in this town once a week.”

My friend bought the deal and before you know it, i was printing the paper on Wednesday evenings after school and on Saturday myself and a few friends walked all over the town putting a newspaper into the doors of each one of the 800 houses in the town.

For the later part of this story, the local Business men’s Association picked up the idea and began to finance me and it finally led to the first newspaper in our town in a Hundred years.

So I ended up being a Teen-aged High School student with a newspaper and once the Businessmen bought me a mailing permit at the post office, I had taken on the neighboring community and we had a weekly circulation of 1,400 copies. The story expands from there into a real enterprise but that is for another story another time.