Christmas Stories

My Italian immigrant mother would give me a stocking filled with candy (and tangerines) from "Befana" a few days after Christmas when I was really young. Then she stopped doing it and assimilated to the American stocking on Christmas Eve from Santa.

When my nephew was five, he started getting into harmless pranks. So I decided to prank him for Christmas. I bought him a ticket to Disneyland. When it was time to go, he was so pumped up and excited, he could hardly stand it. He had never been! But, instead of driving him to Disneyland, I drove him to an old burned-out warehouse. "Oh, no," I said. "Disneyland burned down." He cried and cried, and to this day still doesn't think it's funny. But, one day he'll look back on it and laugh.

r1 That is an incredible story

The last Christmas my mother was alive, for some reason she went wilder with decorating. It wasn’t fancy but it was creative when she filled an oversized brandy glass with pieces of evergreen branches from some bushes outside our house. It was very simple yet turned out very pretty.

That New Year’s Eve my mother died. I was 23. That brandy glass stayed on the table in the den and slowly the branches turned brown. It remained on the table, and no one in my family ever tossed the brown and shriveled branches. None of us talked about it, but apparently all of us wanted that remnant of her last Christmas to stay. Maybe as a memorial.

A year and a half later my father remarried and the day that his new wife moved in to our house, she was carrying something into the den - I don’t remember what it was - and she knocked the brandy glass off the table and it smashed, glass and dead evergreens flying across the floor. I burst into tears, and ran out of the room to mourn my mother once again. Prompted by my father’s new wife.

That's my Christmas 'MARY!' story.

Years ago, my sister lit the fire in my mom's fireplace. She made it so big/hot, that it melted all the candy in the stockings. After a while, all the stockings had brown goo oozing out the bottom from melted chocolate.

r4 Your idiot stepmom did that on purpose. She deserves something heinous to be done to her. Shall we help?

When I was a kid, my best friend's mom made these cookies called "Church Window". It was a chocolate log with mini rainbow marshmallows in the middle. When you sliced the log it looked like "church windows". I loved those cookies and she always gave me extra to take home. I might look for the recipe and make them for some 1970s nostalgia.

R2 That’s just sick. To do that to a 5 five year old. Did you at Least take him to Aa Disneyland after that? You shouldn’t be let around snall chikdren. Sick sicko dsick sick sick.

R6

That occurred. to me. It's possible. She wasn't a very nice woman, and I always referred to her as 'my father's wife' and never as my stepmother.

She didn't much like me, either. She knew I was on to her. But that's a story for another thread.

r8 You are truly an idiot.

[quote] Your idiot stepmom did that on purpose. She deserves something heinous to be done to her. Shall we help?

I propose NEET in her shampoo bottle.

Christmas 2009. My business had collapsed after the 2008 crash. I'd burned through about $500,000 keeping my staff employed and producing, hoping that things would recover. They did not.

Starting in November, in a bid to squeeze every last dime, hubby and I refinanced a condo worth about $800k only to have the bank send out an appraiser who valued the property at $450k. I then got a call from some rando investor who offered to buy the condo... for the appraised value. (Came to find out years later that the appraiser had quite the scam going in undervaluing assets and sending out a vulture capitalist to take advantage of desperate homeowners, but that's another story.) Anyway, finally closed on the loan right before Christmas after the bank tried to pull some shenanigans resulting in delays, having to get the property appraised again by a reputable firm, and then forcing the bank to disregard their appraiser which included numerous arguments and a screaming match at the bank's flagship headquarters between the loan officer, a dime-a-dozen bank VP, me, my accountant and my lawyer, and all in front of about 100 of the bank's customers. The entire process was, in a word, draining.

In the interim, my brother called and begged me to come home for Christmas. I could barely afford to buy gifts, let alone travel, time off, entertain them, the works. But our father had passed and it was the first year his kids wouldn't have Grandpa around... so I acquiesced, stupidly. I arrived, only to have him and Mom present me with their Christmas gift literally at the baggage claim: a gift certificate to their favorite restaurant to take them out to dinner, because they knew how much I enjoyed taking them out to a nice Christmas dinner. And of course it wasn't enough to cover a meal for 7 people, by half. And the reservation was in an hour so hurry up and collect my luggage after flying through two winter storms, one delaying my departure and another delaying my arrival. I was filthy, smelled like an airplane, had been up for almost 24 hours, and just wanted to take a shower and go to bed.

So Christmas day rolls around and it wasn't fun. Nevertheless, I smiled and made the best of it. Around noon, my phone rang with hubby calling to tell me our dog — my "heart dog" that shepherded me through disaster after disaster in the preceding years — had not been eating for three days and he didn't know what to do. There was no vet open on Christmas day, not even the emergency vet hospitals in a 200-mile radius around our home. I frantically searched but couldn't get a flight back until the next day (to the tune of about $2000), and my non-changeable non-refundable return res was for the 27th regardless. I simply couldn't afford to go home one day early. I went into the bathroom and sobbed.

As I lay in my mother's basement guest bedroom that night, thinking it could be worse — I could be [italic]living[/italic] in my mother's basement — I googled "worst Christmas ever."

And that is how I found the Data Lounge.

Epilog: My dog was fine after hubby got him to eat some breakfast on Boxing Day, and lived for 3.5 years. My nephew, now in his 20s, still talks about that Christmas dinner as though it was some magical, right-out-of-the-movies special event. And I sold the condo almost a decade later for $1.4 million.

An enduring childhood Christmas memory—

Each year, my very Catholic aunt would bicker with my very Reform-Jewish father about religion and politics.

It would always end the same each year: with my aunt storming out of the house and speeding off in her red 1976 Buick Century.

We'd have our Christmas day dinner at home before joining relatives at a big get together. A big part of our dinner was oysters. Dad would start shucking them and we'd all be happy as clams. But, inevitably, Dad would stab himself in the palm with the knife so Mom would take over. Eventually, she'd stab herself and the job of shucking fell to me. Usually, I'd end up okay, but sometimes I'd draw blood and the job fell to my little sister. If we couldn't get through all of the oysters without injury, Mom would pop the remainder in the microwave and they'd pop open. This worked, but lukewarm raw oysters are not very appetizing.

I eventually discovered and bought a chain-mail glove, which not only protected your hand, it would speed up the process. But I always imagined a scenario where, a couple of days after Christmas, people would notice that members of our family were missing, and cops would break into our house and discover the four of us, dead on the floor, having bled to death through our hands.

Decades ago I dated a guy who had a very sad childhood. When he was six years old, he and his two younger brothers, aged four and two ,were taken away by CPS on Christmas Eve. He had gone and knocked on a neighbor's door asking for food as their alcoholic mother had left them home alone, again.

All these many years later, his story still crosses my mind on Christmas Eve.

Since this is rapidly becoming a depressing thread, I’ll turn it around and offer happy stories.

Since I was 2-4 years old, I’ve loved going to ride around with my family and looking at Christmas lights while listening to old-fashioned Christmas music. And guess what? A lot of the middle class and poorer neighborhoods have the best lights.

Also, I loved how my parents would track boots through the fireplace and make footprints with them on the floor so I would believe Santa Claus actually came down the chimney.

Back in 1979 my youngest brother was 9 years old and wanted a BB gun. ( this is true, and I didn't get it from A Christmas Story). So our dad and mom got him one. My dad was more than happy to get him one because he was like a kid at Christmas, too. After we opened all our gifts my said " come on we'll all shoot the BB gun!" LOL, we 3 kids were all excited, too! Our kitchen window lined up with the garage. My dad and mom took some cardboard and made a big bullseye sign. My dad went out and opened the garage door and put the target on top of the car. We all took turns shooting it out of the kitchen window even my mom. When my youngest brothers next came, lmao, he shot out the back windshield of my dad's mustang. None of us even thought about that happening! We thought he would be mad, but no he wasn't. We had to ride around in that car with plastic covering the back window for a few weeks until he could replace it. It was pretty funny. Years later my mom said they'd been up early drinking wine, so your dad was a little drunk.

R12, you’re a very good person going to all of those great lengths to ensure your employees jobs. You’re very patient too, no way I would’ve gone to that dinner right off the plane!

I order a Custom Box of See's Chocolates every Christmas just for myself.

Me too, r17. It was thrilling when Dad would turn on to Wisconsin Ave, Boston Store, Gimbels, every downtown store lit up.

In the 1960s, our Dad had one of those low-skilled, high-paying manufacturing jobs in Milwaukee; jobs that are gone forever.

At Christmastime, Mom would get a temporary job at Sears. She'd get dolled up. Hair and make-up just right, simple long sleave sheath dress, dress overcoat and away from us kids for a while. Now I know what a good thing that was for her.

My parent's approach to parenting no longer exists. They were in command, not us, and they meant business.

Rarely would they take us into stores. Except, to our almost faint-worthy excitement, one excursion at Christmastime.

The law was laid down. No acting up. No touching store items. No running. No speaking to store clerks.

Just try it. You'll get that silent, parental stare that could immobilize you like that gun thing did in those old Star Trek episodes.

While in the Ben Franklin store, I became transfixed by a tiny figurine of a reindeer. I reached my little mittened hand out to it.

"Hmmm!", I heard. I looked up. Stare deployed! My siblings and I moved on.

When we got home, Mom said to me "Here". She held a very small white bag. I opened it and inside was that cheap, but beyond valuable, reindeer figurine.

We have the worst family pictures of a Christmas when I was 5 or 6. My mother had a miscarriage a few weeks before (an early one, thank goodness) but my parents were miserable. My grandmother was living with us after she broke her leg, another stressor. Then my other grandparents came. My grandfather was a shutterbug and could be obnoxious with a camera. That accounts for all the shots of everyone looking upset and sad. I look happy but that’s about it. In one picture, my mother has a newspaper over her face.

Looking back at my grandfather’s photos, he was very adept at catching people with their mouths open. He also posed everyone so the sun would be in their eyes.

bump

As a kid, being taken to the Enchanted Village in Jordan Marsh. It took up an entire floor and I loved it.

R12 your reply was literally exhausting to read. Sucks to be you.

We have an awful but hilarious picture of my little brother on Santa's lap when he was 5 or 6, both of them scowling.

The photo was snapped right after Santa Claus asked, "What would you like for Christmas, little boy?" He answered, "None of your business, Fatso."

When I was a kid my family used to keep our presents under the tree. Then, one year we got a new cat who got under the tree and peed on all the presents. We stopped putting presents under the tree after that.

Great stories.

Well done r12 r21.

I really enjoyed the Thanksgiving memories stories, but they pale in comparison to these wonderful Christmas ones. Looking forward to reading more of them!

R2,

Were his parents aware of the prank?

If so, they, like you, are assholes.

I received my first dildo that one Christmas so long ago. . .

[quote]R21/Della: You'll get that silent, parental stare that could immobilize you like that gun thing did in those old Star Trek episodes.

???

"Immobilize? "Gun thing"? "Star Trek"?

PoisonedDragon, at r32

Wasn't there a Star Trek episode (1960s original series) where a villain had a thinga-majig that, if he pointed it at Kirk, Spock, Bones, or whoever, they were frozen in place like a statue?

One Christmas many decades ago as a youngster I ran with a tough crowd. On Christmas Eve 6 or 7 of us collected food for a few days and drink, and rifles and went out looking for people to shoot. We saw some people but they were too far away to shoot.

It was a great Christmas for all

The day after Christmas when plumbers in the US are called into high alert to fix American’s toilets clogged with gallons of feces from gorging themselves on food the prior day.

Hmm. I don't recall a weapon that could be pointed at anyone to immobilize them.

Trelane ('The Squire of Gothos') teleported Kirk and Sulu off the Enterprise bridge. The two were later found in Trelane's drawing room, apparently being used as decorative statuary. He basically just snapped his fingers and released them.

In 'By Any Other Name,' the Kelvans used a control on their 'stasis belts' which could freeze a person in their tracks, or alternatively transform them into chalky cuboctahedrons which could be crushed into powder if desired.

It's the only two instances I can recall.

Hmm... don't mind me. I just read your statement and went 'Huh?', and got lost in 'Trek' minutia.

^^ For R33.

I adore you, PoisonedDragon at r36.

Smoooooches, Doll.

Giving the evil eye to loved ones for not buying the correct gifts on my detailed list.

As I was in the psychiatric institution over Christmas 1983, we inmates had the occasion to watch ‘Rudolph, the Red-Nosed Reindeer’. When the “Island of Misfit Toys” song began, everyone assembled began sobbing, relating their isolation from their families on Christmas to that of the castaways. However, I was able to divorce myself from the proceedings and see the humor in it because one of the patients was also a dead ringer for Yukon Cornelius.

I was molested

My cousin still makes the Struffoli from our childhood. So good. I look forward to the big plate she brings me every year.

My parents kept the Christmas ornaments in a trash bag and then they accidentally threw them all out.

On Christmas Eve one year I stopped to visit my sister and brother-in-law. My brother and a school friend were there.

My brother-in-law wanted us to try something he had to celebrate with, which he and my sister snorted. We all demurred.

About 15 minutes later they both were lying on the floor screaming, hallucinating.

We got them into a car and took them to the ER. They were kept overnight, and released about 11, still out of it and suffering. They couldn't talk and still were having horrible things run around in their heads.

My parents always had a midday dinner so we got them changed and went to my parents' house, and spent the day covering for them. Sitting at the table was like a scene from "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia," with getting food on their plates, pulling attention from outbursts, telling the folks they were just hungover. My brother-in-law kept acting like he was going to throw his silverware, and I kept diverting him.

We were all in our early 20s. I told them next time they were on their own. They didn't return to what for them was normal for about two weeks.

"Horse tranquilizers someone gave me, and I ground them up," my brother-in-law told me. He'd once been my best friend. He gave me mescaline and encouraged me to try this "natural, easy high." He didn't realize he and I took four hits each, and later that evening we and a friend all watched Mae West and W.C. Fields leave the screen and walk through the theater, and still later we were all chased by a giant white cobra on the street.

I got laid on Xmas

Etch A Sketch was my very favorite gift I received as a young kid.

One of mine, too, r46. The best part was shaking it and starting over.

As magical as my parents made Christmas, one year this was under the tree for my sister and me.

No wonder that after a while, when pulling the string to operate it, nothing would happen.

Our parents never replaced the battery. Maybe they were freaked out.

I wish I kept more of my pictures.

I had a vivid imagination as a young child. I was very young, maybe 3 or 4, when I woke up on Christmas Eve/early morning and heard reindeer and sleigh bells on the roof of our tiny house, which didn’t have a chimney, outside of Ft. Worth, TX.

I got up, and snuck down the hall to the living room, where Santa himself was stuffing stockings. He told me to go back to bed, and I did, secure in the knowledge that I’d been good enough for Santa to visit. I still clearly remember this dream that didn’t feel like a dream. It was magical! This would have been around 1969 or so.

Cool, r49

I LOVE peppermint stick ice cream, peppermint bark, fruit cake from Collnstreet Bakery, cashew brittle, egg nog, Cheryl’s iced Christmas cut-out cookies.

My grandmother had one of those aluminum silver Christmas trees. I thought it was so ugly.

I feel guilty to this day for being visibly disappointed my mother got me a Free Spirit (Sears) ten speed bike and not a Schwinn.

bump

One time my large family was getting ready for Christmas Eve but my dad was in the city looking for work. He was late coming home so I distracted my siblings for a while. Eventually my mother sent me out to look for him. It all turned out ok in the end.

R54

Go fuck yourself under a bridge

Fucking prednisone turned me into a raging bitch again. Ugh

Where I worked they had secret santa every year and I dreaded that.

R55, you had a grouchy version of your mother that year.

I always thought it odd that my very Catholic mother and grandmother who went to church every Sunday did not go to midnight mass on Christmas.

Once in late November, I found the hiding place of the Christmas toys. I looked at all of them and wanted two of them in particular - a slot car racing set and a set of Block City building blocks.

On Christmas morning, both of them went to my older brother.

I don't even remember what I got.

[quote] I feel guilty to this day for being visibly disappointed my mother got me a Free Spirit (Sears) ten speed bike and not a Schwinn.

I remember a neighbor (girl) having a Free Spirit bike. They were pretty well-off, IIRC, but I guess the parents economized on that bike. I remember the brother of the girl making fun of the bike because, at the time, there was a bra called a Playtex "Free Spirt" bra.

Yeah kids are mean and stupid

r30 Bless your heart

I wanted cha cha heels.

Oh no not on Christmas!!!!

Also,. if that thread about bad Christmas presents is still floating around here....

The story about the "Chocolate Sista" socks never fails to crack me up.

My Mom worked with a woman who did arts & crafts. My Mom asked for a brown Santa Claus (the woman made them out of plastic chips). We loved hanging him on the front door every year. Unfortunately, we kept the Christmas stuff in the attic. With no A/C, one year, Santa melted into a giant brown blop with red at the top and black at the bottom (hat and boots). We kids were crushed. In the 70s, nothing was available where we lived (all-White neighborhood and surrounding areas) for POC.

My Dad used to put the multi-color Christmas lights outside to frame our front window. One year, we had so much snow we didn't take them down until late February/early March when the weather was nice enough.

We had a wonderful sledding hill in the backyard. Every Winter, we would get those round, red disc sleds. We had to get them every year because we would use them until the last drop of snow melted. They would get all scratched up from sliding on 10% snow and 90% rocks and mud.

We were visiting my relatives in Ireland for Christmas and staying at my aunt's house which was right next door to my grandmother's house. Gran had a bunch of Christmas crackers nestled in her Christmas tree. My sister and I would go over several times a day and ask her if we could each have one. She never said no. When we used all of the Christmas crackers from the tree, she got the spare box of crackers out of a closet and handled the whole thing over. She loved us so much and it makes me smile whenever I think of that moment.

One of my earliest memories is of riding my red and white Radio Flyer tricycle in the house on Christmas.

My most memorable Christmas and maybe yours too! was when a Hitleresque figure retook our White House and usurped our constitution and it was ok with most people and possibly our last Christmas!- Good Times.

Tiny tots will find it hard to sleep on December 24th

"Christmas Eve at an elder gay's OR Oh, Hole-y nite." I had just gotten back from my family's Christmas and went over to meet my bf at his favorite bar, he was waiting for a server friend to meet us, when he arrived we finished our drinks and walked over to the house of a elder gay in his 50's who was a regular at the restaurant my bf managed, bald head and a little Hitler mustache, pleasant demeanor, I was impressed by his Christmas tree. sitting on the couch making polite conversation he decided to get down on all fours where my bf and server friend piled on top of him taking him down and wrestling and rolling around and tickling him just laughing and dry fucking each other. I am just watching this happen, finally exhausted they all got up and the elder gay took me aside and said "You are so lucky to have him!." When he fell asleep my bf took two bottles of his Cabernet.

Your Ex was a thief ? -maybe you’re better off alone? Discuss

r75, I was going to make the case that he wasn't a thief but then I remembered the half cart of linens he stole from a hotel, youthful indiscretions? I have no room to talk i had sticky little fingers myself then too i wouldn't have taken wine I would have taken a ceramic weather owl. I don't think I am better off, he is dead. Blew his head off. MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE!

We took the annual photo of all the grandchildren sitting on my grandmother's staircase.

I have decided to break with tradition and will try NOT to be a bitch this Christmas.

- Bawling my eyes out, along with 39 other basic Air Force trainees, during the first Christmas Eve I had ever spent away from home and family.

-Thinking about all the great fish and seafood dishes were always had on CE. I miss the baccala(sp?) the most.

-I must've been the least curious child because I never even suspected that all the holiday gifts were stored under the raised and skirted plywood platform that was the base for my electric train set-up.

-Being exhausted from all the altar boy duties that had to be endured Christmas week.

-Always looking forward to traveling to visit an aunt and uncle in upper New York State. Tons of snow could always be counted on, along with many venues for sledding, something this city kid didn't get to experience very often.

I sucked cock, feet and ass for 4 hrs today

When I was little we didn't have snow one Christmas and that morning I asked my grandmother how Santa was able to arrive. She said by station wagon. That's how I found out there was no Santa.

My cousin used to have an open house on Christmas Eve.

Her husband’s Jewish family would all show up, because they had no other invites.

My brother and I used to joke that growing up, we spent Christmas Eve with more Jews than Christians.

My sister and I used to take my Mom to a friend's house for dinner on Christmas Eve before going to midnight services (we weren't Catholic but Mom was going to church every Sunday back then). One year, we were enjoying pierogi and shrimp scampi; opening the gifts we bought for each other and having a great time. We were having such a good time that we didn't notice what time it was. We got ready to leave and suddenly remembered that midnight service STARTED at 11:30 pm and ENDED at midnight. We were leaving their house AT 11:30 pm. We all had a good laugh and then we went home.

My Dad had a stroke on Christmas Eve 40 years ago today and died on Christmas Day. In a way it was a blessing.

They had the car loaded and were planning to drive to their place in Florida starting on the 26th. If it had happened when he was driving, he could have killed them both.

I love the midnight concert at St John Cantius in Chicago.

One weird family Christmas mystery that was never solved was when I was around 14. It was the morning of the day before Christmas, and my brother's gift to me, which had been placed neatly under the tree, appeared opened with the gift paper ripped open. Just sort of lying there (it was a poster of James Dean in Rebel w/out a cause). I caught all kinds of shit from my parents and my brother for not being patient enough to wait. The bizzare thing is that IT WASN'T EVEN ME. I don't know who tf it was or what happened but I was not the one to open it. You bet your ass if I had I wouldn't have made it so obvious. To this day I don't know what happened. Was I framed? Did I sleepwalk? Was it a ghost of some kind? I swore up and down it wasn't me but of course no one believed me. Kind of tainted Christmas that year for me

Getting presents I have to throw away immediately after receiving them. Not letting the giver (extended family or B) see me throw their gift in the trash.

My sister Kim's "Christmas Fudge"

Its neverending!

It’s because the gift is too trashy to deal with. Usually if it’s a food item, it contains way too many preservatives or is full of toxic chemicals. If it’s a gift, it usually come from the dollar store and I don’t know what to do with it.