Those of you who read Boomer Journey are endlessly reminded of childhood Christmases whenever you hear holiday music from back in the day or catch the refreshing aroma of woodsmoke or a live Christmas tree. That’s how it still is for me more than a half-century later.
I can never resist donning “The Andy Williams Christmas Album” or the “Great Songs of Christmas,” the latter available from Goodyear tire dealerships in the 1960s. These wonderful vinyl record albums, and dozens of others, take us back to our childhoods when Santa was very real and out there on a cold winter night. It was the rare magical combination of darkness and imagination.
It was all about faith and belief in what we couldn’t see or touch.
Childhood was all about imagination – the freedom to escape to an imaginary world no one knew about but us. It was a nice escape until adulthood arrived and life was never the same. Some of us never segued into adulthood. I will admit to you I’ve never really grown up. I like to close my eyes and escape to the world of imagination – my own little world – which keeps me sane. Dunno about you, but I find it a place where I feel very much at peace.
I think we all need a little bit of that.
Imagination can range from retreating from life for time by yourself, perhaps on a cold winter night on the patio bundled up, taking in the sweet holiday smell of woodsmoke, or listening to the quiet -save for that ringing in our ears. If it is a snowy night, you cannot hear a thing – just wonderful silence and a great sense of peace as snowflakes brush your face and settle to the firmament.
As I have grown older, I’ve found our memories are our greatest escape. Put on the sweet, wonderful holiday music of your past and drift peacefully into a wonderful memory. Though I have a vintage Magnavox stereo console in my office that was my mother’s, I instead listen to traditional holiday music on YouTube or Google Home to enjoy the same music we did as kids. Technology has passed that classic Maggie up – yet it remains an integral part of those childhood Christmas memories.
Whatever holiday tradition you celebrate – be it Christmas, Chanukah, or any number of other religious beliefs from around the world, as long as you are sharing the memories and the happiness, that’s all that matters friends. Let us all be accepting of one another’s traditions and beliefs. Be safe and comfortable this holiday season.
Always remember to give.
Boomer Journey... 
Holiday music, indeed any music, can drop us into memories, or into that place where we write our own fictions. Are they fantasies, corrections or simply flights of fancy? It doesn’t matter. As for not growing up – seventy or eighty years. Your body changes, but you don’t change at all. And that, of course, causes great confusion. – Doris Lessing
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