Posted on 12/17/2020 3:58:36 AM PST by knarf
Here in SW Pa, I can't remember the last time we had a true white Christmas.
I know the department stores I remember as a child in the 50's in Boston don't exist any more ... and that's too bad.
memories.
The stores USED TO be crammed with snow toys for Christmas and all I saw in Walmart the other day was some cheap, plastic snow coasters ... those round things that suck.
So I woke up this morning to about 7 or 8 inches of TERRIFIC dry snow .... and my body is too un-cooperative for me to enjoy it.
Merry Christmas.
They can't fire you for saying that
I remember cardboard boxes to slide on. I remember taking a shovel to a nearby pond to clear the snow so we could ice skate. Such fond memories.
I used to hate snowfalls. Gotta get up an hour early to shovel out the driveway so I could go to work.
Now it’s put on a pot of coffee, and just look at the wonderland outside my window. Growing old is not without its perks.
Fallon Field, a local baseball diamond, was flooded every year with about a foot or so of water in a Boston area suburb and I too remember shoveling the snow off ... I also learned what rubber ice is ... the hard way
Landed on your fanny a few times, eh?
(I haven't talked like that in over 65 years)
Yes, rubber ice. I forgot about that.
Yes. Play clothes and dress clothes. The minute we got home from school we put on play clothes.
> I also learned what rubber ice is ... the hard way <
Many, many years ago I was just learning to drive. It was during the winter. Since I only had a learner’s permit, my dad would go with me.
We’re coming back from one practice drive, and it was snowing. My dad tells me to slow down when turning onto our driveway. There might be some ice on it. But what does he know? After all, I’ve been driving for almost two weeks now.
So I turned into our driveway with my usual gusto. The car hit a patch of ice and slid right into our garage door, splitting it in two.
I guess my dad was right after all.
And for me, being one of eight ... 6 boys and 2 girls ... my play clothes were often my brother's from last year.
Do they even make sleds any more?
I inherited my Mom’s Yankee Clipper and had a little Red Arrow...used it for years.
Now I never see them, at least in the box stores and certainly not in use.
We lived in flat as hell NJ...best you could do was running belly flops on the icy roads or grabbing the bumpers of passing cars. Sad part was some kid would usually be killed during the winter doing that.
But we had no hills...
I still have 2 early 60’s flexible flyers in the garage.
A few years ago we had several inches of snow here in NC.
The kids in the neighborhood were sliding in front of our house. Those 2 sleds became really popular when they realized they were the fastest thing on the hill. With the right hill, we’d go better than half a mile with those - and we’d keep riding those last 25 feet - barely moving until they inched to a stop.
State College PA looks like about 16 inches this morning.
Sleds ?
Kids today have no clue ... kind'a like ... 
I grew up in Roslindale ... not much different than Smallville or Mayberry ... outside of Boston and we had hills.
If you're young enough ... try to find a sled and go down a hill before you die ... (older) kids NEED those memories.
My sister has a small scar on her chin from hitting a small snow bank going down on her stomach and sliding forward on her Flexible Flyer
...
We always opened our gifts Christmas Eve!
My Grandmother made the BEST fruitcake!
Hooky-bobbing?
Everyone dressed up to go shopping,...go to church...fly on a plane, train.....elegant time
Speaking of sleds, my brother inherited our uncle’s sled and I had my aunt’s. His sled was easy to turn. Mine..not. One day we decided to slide down “Standpipe Hill”. Everything went well. We dodged trees..swerving this way and that..until one tree was in my way. I made a dive off the sled..rolled away..looked at my sled and it was going boing, boing boing stuck in the tree. I was lucky I didn’t clobber my head.
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