As you read this, another Christmas is just around the corner. So I thought I would share my favorite memory of a past Christmas, My kids were young and we had just moved to a hobby farm in Sandy, Oregon, a modest home with a nice barn on a few acres. A few days before Christmas we received over 12 inches of snow which was pretty exciting.
What’s a cassette tape?
Back then (I know I’m aging myself as we didn’t have CD’s and Alexa) we had cassette tapes. As most young couples on a budget we could only afford one Christmas cassette so we played it over and over and over. For those that have no idea what a cassette looks like it’s a small 4” case and has a magnetic tape in it with music recorded on it. The tape would constantly get twisted up and you had to manually take a finger or pencil and turn it back and forth to get straighten so it would play. Another wonderful attribute was that sometimes your cassette player actually decided it was hungry and would eat the tape.
Children do hear everything
You know that saying, “Careful the things you say, children are always listening?” I found they also listen to so much more. That Christmas, we were just sitting by the tree and my oldest started talking about Grandma, and he was concerned! Over the past week he had heard the song “Grandma got ran over by a reindeer” on the tape we had been playing. After it played again for the 50th time, he asked me if Grandma was going to be alright after getting run over by a reindeer. Then his brother jumped in and said I thought Santa’s reindeer were friendly? At this point we had a full blown melt down and all 3 kids started to cry.
Did Grandma survive getting run over by a reindeer?
It took a moment to answer but my wife and I were laughing so hard it gave our daughter a chance to get in on it. She ran to the window and asked if grandma was still out there buried under the snow? My youngest son started to cry even more and ran to the window searching for grandma. Minutes later as they stood at the windows crying they saw her drive up and I could tell the kids were pretty happy to find her in good shape. Later that night after things calmed down, I was tucking my son into bed and we heard “Mommy kissing Santa Clause” playing on that tape. He asked, “Do all Mommies kiss Santa Clause?” I smiled and said, “Only the lucky ones son, only the lucky ones”.
Greg Rosen is a Father, Husband, Realtor and humorist writer for several major newspapers. Questions or comments can be sent to [email protected]. If you like what you see please share.