Memories of Christmas 1966: The Camera

My camera was like the one to the life (I'm not sure if it was the exact same model). I borrowed the photo from here.

Christmas 1966 fell on a Sunday. As had become the tradition of most American kids, we got up early. I think it was 4:30 A.M. We knew we had to get up early because we were leaving the house for our grandparents by 7 A.M. and we wanted to have to time check out our loot. My parents weren't up as early as us as they'd been giving Santa a hand the night before. In pajamas, we stood in the hall way as my father set up his Super-8 movie camera. Dad had a bank of bright lights that he turned on and called us to come into the living room, with the camera rolling. Struck by the lights, our hands jerked up over our eyes, making us look like we witnesses to a nuclear dawn. Every Christmas morning started this way, and every year we had hands over our eyes as if we were shielding our face from the flash. I don’t remember what I got that year, but after checking it all out, we got to select one gift to take with us and we laded up the car and headed to Moore County, 120 miles to the west. This was our first car trip with my little brother.

First stop was at my mother’s parent’s home. In their living room was a cedar tree that my granddaddy had cut out on the edge of a field. It was simply decorated with only white lights, red balls and silver tinsel and was one of the most beautiful trees I’ve ever seen. Under the tree were presents for each of us and in the corner, behind the door, was a box of oranges. Granddaddy always had oranges. They gave me a Kodak Instamatic camera that year. It came in a box and with a roll of film and a square flash cube. You got four flashes per cube, one on each side. But I didn't get a chance to try it out right away. My brother, sister and I had to put our presents away and head to church. I didn’t see this as being fair as it was only my family (less my mother and the baby), who were going to church. My cousins who were just beginning to arrive didn't have to go,. Neither the fact that Christmas fell on Sunday nor that fact that we were in church the evening before were good enough excuses for us to miss church. My father loaded my brother and sister and I into the car and we headed over to Culdee. After worship, we came back over to my grandparents house. By then all the cousins were there.

We ate a big lunch and then left the grown-ups inside to play with my brother, as the rest of us headed outside and ran around in the fields, climbed over my granddad’s old orange Allis Chambers' tractor, and pretended to drive the old junk cars that were out in the woods. There were still maps in the glove compartments from the 40s and it was fun to take a trip using the maps. As the sun was dropping low in the sky, my parents gathered us all in to get us ready to go over to my other grandparents home for dinner. But before we left, I coaxed my grandparents outdoors for a picture. They stood in front of the big holly bushes that sat on each side of the stoop up to the porch of their home. My grandmother was tall and slim, my granddaddy shorter and stouter. He sported a crew cut. They held each other by the waist and I snapped the picture. A few weeks later, when I got the roll developed, I realized it was a bit crooked and off centered. Yet, it was a sharp image and was probably the last photograph taken of my grandfather.

Two weeks later, on a Monday morning, we were again making the trip to Moore County. My granddad’s heart finally gave out. He’d been fighting emphysema for years, brought on by too many cigarettes and probably made worst by working as a welder in a shipyard during the war. He was only two years older than I am now.

I'll try to finish up and post another 9th grade memory before Christmas--Williston's White Christmas or how to extend your Christmas holiday to an eternity.