Here’s to friendship, here’s to you
This dear December day.
Old Santa Claus is coming,
We know he’ll pass your way.
We send to you this Yuletide
The wish that never ends,
It’s health and happiness and cheer,
And full blessings to our friends.
Last year, Irvingtonian Bruce Gable sent a card with a drawing of Santa Claus on the front that his brother, Mike, drew in 1976. Mike’s Santa isn’t like the fat, ho-ho-ho Santa of the old Coca-Cola ads. He’s a very old man with deep-set eyes that look as if they see and contemplate everything. Inside is the above poem written by their father, George. I told Bruce how much I liked it, and he loaned me a scrapbook of Christmas letters and poems that his father had written between 1929 and 1960. Bruce wrote:
Perfection Paint & Color Co. was the Gable family business. It was started by my grandfather in 1924. The factory was located at 715 East Maryland. For a few years during the 1930’s, his family lived in the Audubon Court. For many years we hand packaged and mailed mixed nuts to our customers at Christmas. With the nuts was a Christmas greeting or poem written by my father.
I never knew George, but I can imagine what he was like because I know Bruce who is one of the most cheerful people I know. During the period that George wrote, America went through the stock market crash, the Great Depression, World War II and the war in Korea. Regardless of those cataclysmic events, George’s calm and cheerful attitude shines through his writing. Clearly, here was a wise man who understood, loved and practiced the spirit of Christmas.
My nephew, John Jones, is another very wise man. He wrote,
My children lament, “Dad, you are so hard to buy for”, and they are correct. If I really want something, I’ll get it if I can afford it. If I can’t afford it, neither can they. Instead, I tell them all that I really want each and every Christmas is to be surrounded by my family. I long for the laughter of children, the banter, good cheer, tables laden with good food and the love of all. I revel in hearing their footfalls throughout the house, their smiles and feeling their glee. My Christmas comforter is removed from the trunk of my memories of Christmas days of the past and added to each year . . .
Last week I mentioned receiving a sweater that Mother could ill afford. Mother had little to give materially, but what she had she gave with a generous and loving heart. My sister, Christine Jones, and her husband had eight children. Hence, there was little money, for gifts. During family Christmas gatherings, we made frequent trips to the bathroom so we could laugh about the kids’ inventive gifts.
Mother collected fancy coffee cups. No two were alike. When he was a teenager a gleeful John exclaimed “I have the perfect gift for Grandma!” It was a doll’s tea set. Mary had no money so she made little “pillows” out of scraps on which she sewed bubble gum charms and safety pins. Mother’s “brooch” was a little skillet with a fried egg because she liked to cook. My stepfather received one with a dog. Christine gave Dee and Sharon $20 to shop for their siblings at Danners Five and Ten Cents Store. They found a big, beautifully dressed doll with a three dollar price tag near it for Mary. They took it to the clerk who let them have it even though it was the display doll for baby clothes.
Every year I set out with the crèche that my parents gave me when I was 12 years old a statuette of a dog that Sharon gave me. She broke it in two places and went bawling to Christine who said, “Just glue it back together. She’ll never notice it.”
Bill said, “Those are the gifts that are never forgotten.” wclarke@comcast.net
P.S. John says that he still has the little tea set.