Holiday memories, first

I have decided that I shall write posts "for over break" again this year, and time-embargo them so they will be periodically posted throughout the break. Most of these will be holiday links or holiday memories.

Today: "A Child's Christmas in Wales."

I don't think I was very familiar with this poem before high school; one year we had the actor Hugh Dowling come as an artist-in-residence, and at the time he was part of a production of this (as a stage play) in Cleveland; we were all given tickets and taken to see it.

It's a wonderful, nostalgic piece. A version of it can be found online here

One of my favorite parts was about the Useful and the Useless Presents:

""There were the Useful Presents: engulfing mufflers of the old coach days, and mittens made for giant sloths; zebra scarfs of a substance like silky gum that could be tug-o'-warred down to the galoshes; blinding tam-o'-shanters like patchwork tea cozies and bunny-suited busbies and balaclavas for victims of head-shrinking tribes; from aunts who always wore wool next to the skin there were mustached and rasping vests that made you wonder why the aunts had any skin left at all; and once I had a little crocheted nose bag from an aunt now, alas, no longer whinnying with us. And pictureless books in which small boys, though warned with quotations not to, would skate on Farmer Giles' pond and did and drowned; and books that told me everything about the wasp, except why."

Yes, the childhood memories of getting warm clothes. It didn't happen often during my childhood - mainly being, I think, my parents had enough money to provide us with warm clothes "for ordinary," and so, they preferred to by fripperies (toys and games and candy) for Christmas presents for us. I suppose our presents were more in the class of Useless Presents:

"Bags of moist and many-colored jelly babies and a folded flag and a false nose and a tram-conductor's cap and a machine that punched tickets and rang a bell; never a catapult; once, by mistake that no one could explain, a little hatchet; and a celluloid duck that made, when you pressed it, a most unducklike sound, a mewing moo that an ambitious cat might make who wished to be a cow; and a painting book in which I could make the grass, the trees, the sea and the animals any colour I pleased, and still the dazzling sky-blue sheep are grazing in the red field under the rainbow-billed and pea-green birds. Hardboileds, toffee, fudge and allsorts, crunches, cracknels, humbugs, glaciers, marzipan, and butterwelsh for the Welsh. And troops of bright tin soldiers who, if they could not fight, could always run. And Snakes-and-Families and Happy Ladders. And Easy Hobbi-Games for Little Engineers, complete with instructions. Oh, easy for Leonardo! And a whistle to make the dogs bark to wake up the old man next door to make him beat on the wall with his stick to shake our picture off the wall. And a packet of cigarettes: you put one in your mouth and you stood at the corner of the street and you waited for hours, in vain, for an old lady to scold you for smoking a cigarette, and then with a smirk you ate it. And then it was breakfast under the balloons."

(I'm old enough to remember candy cigarettes. I highly doubt they are sold any more. I wasn't particularly taken by them, coming from an adamantly non-smoking family.)


Incidentally, if you want to make your own Useful Nosebag (which I always envisioned as being like a nosewarmer, the equine allusion notwithstanding), there is a pattern out there for one.

I suppose there are real "useful" and "useless" presents out there. (Thomas seems to imply in his poem - or at least, I infer from it - that the "useless" presents were perhaps more appreciated). I actually tend to give a lot of "useful" presents to family members; most of them are in places in life where further fripperies - figurines or fancy jewelry (which I can't afford anyway) are just another thing to dust, or to pack during a move.

I often give food as a present. That can be "useful" in the sense that it nourishes the body. But it can also be GOOD food, something special and different, and so, nourish the soul as well. (I give lots of tea to the tea-drinkers this time of year. I like getting tea as a gift, myself.)

Sometimes your presents fall short. You think something will be appreciated that is not, or you misread a person. Or sometimes someone misreads you: getting a gift you hate. (I admit openly that I agree with the "Admit it: you love getting gifts." But I heartily disagree with the idea of food being a universally bad gift. As I said: I like getting tea. I would enjoy getting fancy cookies or nice chocolate or fancy preserves or something like that. One of the nice things about a food gift is that you can enjoy it, but then you don't have to dust it or clean it for the rest of your life.)

May whatever gifts you get be "useful" gifts, or, if they are of the "useless" variety, may they be gloriously enjoyable in their uselessness.