Christmas Story

I thought you all might like my Christmas story.

A favorite memory of mine, which I thought I would share with farm folks. Coming home from Midnight Mass many many years ago, back when it actually meant Midnight, so this was probably 1:30 in the morning. Mom and younger brother scampered into the house, up the back steps and left me last. Pop was already in the house. I walked up the steps, and stopped. I looked North.
Our huge hay barn in the barn yard, was all closed up. The 8 milk cows were safe inside, both horses were inside, I knew they were warm, and safe, and everybody was probably asleep. Overhead sky was a obsidian black, stars brilliant. The North Star was directly over the peak of the barn. The night was as still as could be, and bitter cold. Running thru my head was ".... Silent Night ...." It's been almost 70 years.

not too far behind you.
nice story, experienced it too.

Yes!

Great story. Merry Christmas.

The most memorable Christmas Eve that I can recall was about 15 years ago. Our three kids, probably aged 5-9 were in the church Christmas Eve service and we were getting them ready for the 7:00 PM service. It was about 6:15 that evening. It was dark, cold, but no bad weather and the air was still. Suddenly, our power went out. My wife lit a few candles and scurried to get our kids dressed, pretty much in the dark. I found a flashlight, waited about 10 minutes and called in to our power company, assuming that multiple customers had already alerted them ahead of me. We live in the boonies, are pretty much on the end of the supply lines and our electrical provider is a cooperative. The lady taking our call was surprised to receive the call and assured me that I was the first to call it in. She made sure that we had paid our bill (was kinda surprised that there was even a chance that they would cut power to somebody on Christmas Eve night) and then told us that they would check it out. A couple of hours later we were coming home from church and there the the electrical boom truck about a quarter mile from our lane with a guy up in the bucket, along with a couple of other assist trucks parked beside it. Our house was the only one in three counties that had lost power. I felt really bad that I interrupted a half-a-dozen electrical employees from their Christmas eve time with their families, but I guess they knew that something like that could happen when they applied for the job.

Mine would be Christmas 1971 at the Bob Hope USO Christmas show in DaNang, Vietnam. Off the firebase for a few hours and listening to 5000+ G.I.s singing Silent Night to end the show. First and last time away from home for Christmas.

Our oldest daughter, only child at that time, was about 3. An older neighbor(Tom) called Christmas afternoon and asked what time we wanted Christa to go to bed. We said about 7:30 or so. He said he and Betty would be down about 7:30 and he would walk around the outside of the house with some sleigh bells jingling them and we could tell her Santa was checking up on her. I said that would be fun to see her reaction. They showed up right at 7:30 and we were expecting them. Betty sat in the car while Tom went around the house jingling the bells. We all heard them and Christa said what's that sound? I said it sounded like Santa was checking to see if she was asleep yet or not. She jumped up and said, I have to go to bed so Santa will come, and headed right to bed. A few minutes later, Tom and Betty knocked on the door and came inside. Christa was already in bed asleep. We all had a good laugh and visited a bit and then they went home.
Fast forward to the next year. Alta bought Christa a lot of toys that needed to be put together, wood toy box, kitchen set and a couple more things, I don't remember what except they had a million pieces that needed to be put together. We lived in a small house and there was no place to hide anything big from Christa, so I said I would stay up and put it all together after she went to bed. At 2 am I finally gave up, still didn't have the first one all together. Needless to say, she got several items that needed to be put together after Christmas.
Fast forward about 10 years and 3 houses. 3 kids now, the house had a short steep bank in front of the house. It snowed good late Christmas Eve. Santa brot all 3 kids snow coasters. Middle child (Casey) woke up about 3am, fresh snow, new snow coaster from Santa, so he got dressed and went out and tried it out for quite a while in the dark. Them he came inside and dried it off and put it back with Santa's gifts and went back to bed like nothing happened. We all woke up around 6 and they were all excited about the snow and the new snow coasters. Only give away was all the tracks in the fresh snow. Casey said that he hadn't thought about that. We all had a good laugh about it. Chris

Couldn't find DaNang, will Long Binh work? Thank you for your service! Joe
BOB

Hi,
I too was at the 71 Bob Hope USO show at DaNang. I recall that the Ding-a-lings were part of the show. Bob Hope has always been my hero for what he did with entertaining the troops. I was stationed at Lz Hawkhill with the 723 maint batt, Charlie co in the Americal Div.

Regards
1Lt Thomas Messing

Hello LT. Yes the Ding A Lings were there, along with Jim Nabors + others. I have a picture of Bob and Jim Nabors getting off the chopper that brought them in to Camp Eagle and I was about 10 ft. away. Remember "Silent Night" to close it out? Quite touching. I was with B Battery, 3/82 with the 196th. FDC. Firebase Linda among others. We were the last combat unit to leave and fired the last U.S. artillery round in Nam on 10 Aug., 1972 Operation Gimlet. Welcome home. Bill