High Hopes for the New Year

Everyone usually has high hopes on New Year’s Eve that the coming year will be better than the last. As the old Frank Sinatra song goes, if you are like that ant who wants to move the rubber tree plant “You gotta have high-apple-pie-in- the-sky hopes.”

In January, my brother, Ted’s, Fish and Chips column comes from 1987. In it he totals up his score for his yearly predictions for local politics, local concerns, the weather, and sports to name a few. It’s a very historical piece and has names in it you may remember from that time.

While I have made my own predictions in the past as to the future of Rockland and the area, I’m really not qualified to make the predictions he did. I can however have “high hopes” for the old hometown.

I have predicted that the area on Route 1 between Rockland and Thomaston would be even more developed than it was in 2009 or 2010. I think I was right on the money on that one. There will be a new Walmart in that area soon. I predict that the area will continue to be developed to include even more shopping areas.

What is needed, however, is a good mall like those in other areas of Maine. As it is, folks from Knox County have to travel a good distance to do any serious shopping. Maybe that is in the future for the area? We’ll see.

There are those who say that we need to support our local small businesses, the small shops, the specialty shops that abound along Main Street. I totally agree and applaud the local organization that recently formed “flash shopping sprees” to a particular business in town. The members all get together at a certain time and all go into the designated store to buy something. That’s a wonderful idea that I hope continues. I think my friend Tim Sullivan and others were behind this idea.

Maybe these two ideas may clash, but I think there’s room for both shopping ideas in the area. It will also be interesting to see what kind of business or other venture will replace the abandoned Walmart store up on Camden Street. I know there is a “Camden Street Committee” who is working on this problem. As I’ve said before, if there is an adventurous entrepreneur out there with deep pockets who could develop the space into a sports arena for local teams like the Rock City Rockers, that would be wonderful. It could also be used for other sports ventures involving the youth of the area, like basketball camps and the like. The Rec Center cannot handle all of those extracurricular activities.

The development of the waterfront in Rockland in recent years has also been nice to see. When I come home; go down to Sandy Beach and sit at one of the picnic tables to have lunch; and look out and see all those yachts, sloops, and the like, it warms my heart. The scene was much different in my youth what with the fish factory and all. You who grew up there know what I mean.

The only thing that may be bad is the increased traffic in the area what with the new restaurants and other businesses close by. The South End is no longer the quiet sleepy area it once was. It is also becoming an extension of the artistic community and galleries of uptown. I noted a special day this past year in which people were invited to visit artist’s studios in the South End.

The redevelopment of the South End that was begun by the credit card complex along Water Street has really taken off, even if the company is now long gone. What could have turned into a disaster for Rockland economically, has become a concerted effort to continue on where the credit card company left off. I say bravo to everyone involved in this effort.

What do I hope for the New Year and for the future of Rockland? Let’s say I hope there are more companies, even a factory or two that can employ more local people who are now out of work. There is still plenty of land left, maybe along the Route 1 corridor north from Rockland to Camden. That area needs to catch up with the Thomaston-Rockland corridor going south on Route 1.

I know that there are many reasons that I may not be aware of that are keeping industry from the area. Transportation may be one of them, but I know that taxes and the like probably come into play too.

I also hope for a medical complex that will include heart specialists and other much needed medical areas not now available for the Knox County area. If you need those specialists you still have to go to Portland or beyond to consult; to have major operations; to have easy access to a specialist. Such a facility is long overdue and very much needed. We need a new committee to delve into those possibilities.

Of course I am saying a lot from down here in Georgia where I live. But I do hope to move back home in the future and other older people like me may choose to make the move back home to the mid-coast area too if they know they can feel safe there.

So these are my hopes and dreams for Rockland and the surrounding areas. We can move that rubber tree plant if we all work together.

Happy New Year and thanks for listening.

In Remembrance

Instead of giving you a Christmas letter this year, I’d like to pay tribute to some people we lost during the past year. Many of these names existed in my own personal past. I’m sure that is true with you too. They will live on in their songs; they will live on in late-night movies. We will remember their accomplishments; their contributions to our world.

Before we begin, however, I’d like to pay tribute to those special babies who lost their lives in Newtown, along with the teachers who tried to save them. The last two precious ones were buried today. They were only famous in the way they died, but who knows what those little ones may have accomplished in their lives had they lived.

I truly believe they are safe in the arms of those wonderful teachers who tried to protect them and who also died as a result. They will protect them forever now.

Recently, my great-nephew, Nicholas, who is four I believe, and who lives in Connecticut not that far from Newtown, lost his precious dog, Noah. He told his mother he was going to ask Santa to bring him back for his Christmas present this year. I suspect that Noah, who has a biblical name we all know, a man who saved the animals two by two, was waiting for these little ones at the Rainbow Bridge when they passed into heaven.

Here are some of the more well-known people who passed away this year. Among them are Senators, entertainers, a Nobel Prize winner, a sports legend, authors, a chef, a famous mother, composers, astronauts, TV show hosts, a publisher, a reverend, directors, a film critic, a former Prime Minister, a hair stylist, a mobster, a TV producer, a screenwriter.

As I read their obits I noticed that many of them died of one form of cancer or another. If there is one disease, which has many forms, we should at last conquer its cancer. So many of our favorite people are taken by this health scourge. If you contribute to just one charity this year, make it for Cancer research. As a breast cancer survivor, I thank you.

Here is my list in no particular order:

Senator Daniel Inouye, of Hawaii. One of the longest serving members of Congress. He was a much decorated WWII veteran.

Ravi Shankar, sitarist popular in the 60s. I think the Beatles were associated with him.

Jenni Rivera, Spanish singer who died in a plane crash in New Mexico just recently.

Dave Brubeck, jazz pianist. I especially remember “Take Five.” He died a day before his 92^nd birthday.

Joseph Murray, Nobel Prize winner. He performed the first successful kidney transplant.

Hector “Macho” Camacho, former Puerto Rican welterweight champion. He was shot in Puerto Rico.

Larry Hagman, of “Dallas” and “I Dream of Jeanie.” Son of Mary Martin.

Deborah Raffin, actress/audiobook publisher, of leukemia. She was 59.

Bryce Courtenay, author of “The Power of One,” a story of a child growing up under apartheid in South Africa. He was 79.

Art Ginsburg, TV chef known as “Mr. Food.” He was 81.

Warren Rudman, Former senator, don’t know where, at 82.

Etta James, soul singer

Teri Shields, mother of Brooke, at 79. I believe she suffered from Alzheimer’s.

Elliott Carter, composer, winner of two Pulitzer Prizes, at 103.

George McGovern, former senator. He took an anti-Vietnam war stance in 1972 in his presidential race against Nixon. I voted for him. He was 90.

Natina Reed, singer with the R&B group, Blaque, at 32. She was hit by a car in Atlanta.

Sylvia Kristel, Dutch actress, known for her role in “Emmanuelle” She was 60.

Arlen Spector, former Senator from Pennsylvania, at 82.

Gary Collins, TV show host and also MC for Miss America pageant, at 74.

Arthur Sulzberger, publisher of the New York Times for 34 years, at 86.

Johnny Lewis, actor in “Sons of Anarchy.” Found dead in a driveway. He was suspect in a murder case.

Andy Williams, crooner best known for his song from “Breakfast at Tiffany,” “Moon River.”

John Ingle, actor who played Edward Quartermaine on the soap, “General Hospital” for 430 episodes. He was 84.

Dorothy McGuire, singer in the 1950s-60s, at 85.

Michael Clark Duncan, played a death-row inmate in “The Green Mile.” He was 54.

Rev. Sun Myung Moon, controversial Unification Church minister, who had millions of followers. I remember we called these worshippers “Moonies.” I also remember that he married about 100 couples all at the same time.

Hal David, lyricist. Known for “Raindrops Keep Falling on my Head,” and “Walk on By,” at 91.

Neil Armstrong, former astronaut who commanded Apollo 11 and who was the first man on the moon, at 82.

Jerry Nelson, who did the voice of Count von Count and Herry Monster on Sesame St., at 78.

Phyllis Diller, comedian with a long career. She was 95.

Tony Scott, director, at 68. He jumped off Vincent Thomas Bridge in Long Beach, California.

Joey Kovar, reality TV star of “Real World; Hollywood,” and “Celebrity Rehab 3.” He was found dead in Chicago.

Ron Palillo, actor who played Arnold Horshack on “Welcome Back Kotter,” at 68.

Helen Gurley Brown, editor of Cosmopolitan, author of many books with a feminine slant. She helped usher in the sexual revolution. I saw her speak at a woman’s conference in Connecticut in the 60s or 70s.

Al Freeman Jr., star of the movie, “Malcolm X, at 78.

Mel Stuart, director. He directed “Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory,” at 83.

Stuart Swanlund, guitarist for the Marshall Tucker Band, at 54.

Marvin Hamlisch, composer, at 68.

Judith Crist, well-known film critic.

Gore Vidal, author, at 86.

Tony Martin, Last of the big-name singer-actors of the Golden Age of Hollywood, at 98.

Chad Everett, actor, at 75.

Sherman Hemsley, star of the spin off from “All in the Family,” the “Jeffersons,” and later the TV show “Amen.”

Sally Ride, astronaut, first woman in space, at 61.

Ginny Tyler, one of the original Mouseketeers, at 86. She did voices in “The Sword in the Stone,” and “Mary Poppins.”

Bill Asher, director…”I Love Lucy” and “Bewitched,” at 90.

Levon Helm, drummer and singer for “The Band,” at 71.

Kitty Wells, Queen of Country Music, at 92.

Earl Scruggs, bluegrass legend/banjo pioneer, at 88.

Robin Gibb, member of the band Bee Gees, at 62.

Celeste Holm, one of my mother’s favorite actresses, who won an Oscar, at 95.

Dick Clark, our favorite TV host of “Bandstand” and a many time MC of New Year’s “Rockin’ New Years Eve.” He was 82. I did a special tribute blog to him this year.

Sage Stallone, son of Sylvester Stallone, at 36.

Maria Cole, wife of Nat King Cole, at 89.

Ernest Borgnine, actor, at 95. He and Lauren Bacall was an item.

Andy Griffith, everyone’s favorite on TV, at 86.

Alan Poindexter, two-time shuttle astronaut. He died in a jet-ski accident at 50.

Yitzhak Shamir, former Israeli Prime Minister, at 96.

Doris Singleton, actress who played one of the Ricardo’s neighbors on “I Love Lucy.”

Richard Adler, composer for “Damn Yankees” and “The Pajama Game,” at 90.

Vidal Sassoon, well known hair fashion hairstylist, at 84.

Maurice Sendak, author of “Where the Wild Things Are,” at 83.

Adam Yanch, of the Beastie Boys, at 49.

Rodney King, known as a victim in the 1992 beating during the Los Angeles riots. He drowned in his swimming pool at 50.

Henry Hill, mobster, said to belong to the Lucchese crime family, at 69.

Ann Rutherford, actress who was a member of the O’Hara family in “Gone with the Wind.” She was 94.

Frank Cady, known in the recurring role of storekeeper, Sam Drucker, in “Petticoat Junction,” “The Beverly Hillbillies,” and “Green Acres.”

Bob Welch, was a member of Fleetwood Mac, at 66.

Ray Bradbury, one of my favorite Science-Fiction authors, at 91.

Herb Reed, last of the founding members of The Platters, at 83.

Richard Dawson, TV host actor, and comedian. He was host of “Family Feud,” on the panel of the “Match Game” and also starred in the TV show, “Hogan’s Heroes” which was based on the movie “Stalag 13,” a prisoner-of-war camp in Germany during WWII.

Kathryn Joosten, who won two Emmys for her role in “Desperate Housewives.”

Dick Beals, the voice of “Speedy Alka-Seltzer.”

Jim Paratore, TV producer of “The Tyra Banks Show,” the “Ellen” Degeneres show, the “Rosie O’Donnell Show.” He died at 58, while bike riding in France.

Donna Summer, the “Queen of Disco.” She was 63.

Don Cornelius, “Soul Train” creator, of an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound at his home in Sherman Oaks.

Whitney Houston, the diva of all divas in Pop music, at 48.

Chuck Brown, Godfather of Go Go, at 75.

Davy Jones, lead singer for the Monkees.

Nora Ephron, Academy Award nominee for screenplays for “When Harry Met Sally” and “Sleepless in Seattle,” at 71.

A long list to be sure and there are names I left out. I wish everyone good health in 2013.

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Gingerbread Recipe

from the Nathanial Bowditch

 

This recipe came from my Nathaniel Bowditch newsletter. I thought I would share it with you. See the video below also. A trip on this schooner, which sails out of Rockland, Maine, would make a wonderful Christmas present. The captain’s wife, Cathie, was my hand therapist one summer.  I hope to sail on it one day. If you go, see if my book is still aboard. I gave them one to share with their passengers. If the video sticks, just keep hitting the center and it will come back. There is a wonderful shot of the schooner going under the Bucksport Bridge. For more information call

1-800-288-4097 or go to:

www.windjammervacation.com

This is our favorite Old Fashioned Gingerbread recipe - though we do dress it up a little for our Bowditch family and passengers.   Ingredients:   1/2 cup white sugar 1/2 teaspoon salt 1/2 cup butter 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon 1 egg 1 teaspoon ground ginger 1 cup of molasses 1/2 teaspoon ground cloves 2/12 cups all purpose flour 1 cup hot water 1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda   Directions: 1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease and flour one 9 inch square pan. 2. Cream together the sugar and butter. Add egg and beat well. Mix in the molasses. 3. Sift together the flour baking soda, salt, cinnnamon, ginger and clove. Add the dry ingredients to the creamed mixture, add the hot water, and mix well. 4. Pour the batter into the pan and bake for one hour. Allow to cool for one hour and serve.   To make this the "Bowditch" way - add 2 tablespoons coarsely chopped candied ginger to batter and mix well - bake as directed. You can also add 1 cup of blueberries, (fresh or frozen, doesn't much matter). And...since we are making it the "Bowditch" way, top with whipped cream - 1 cup whipping cream, add 2 tablespoons sugar add 1 tablespoon dark rum (instead of the usual vanilla). Pour a shot glass full of dark rum - drink it, you have been working hard all day and now deserve a break. Serve the "grog" whipped cream on top of the gingerbread . A true sailor's delight.

Last Minute Christmas Shopping

The most panicky last-minute shopper I ever knew was my Aunt Freda Hilton. She always did things at the last minute and was also notoriously late for events. If we invited her to a family doing we told her it was an hour earlier and maybe then she might show up on time.

In my high school years I worked at Newberrys during vacations and in the summer. Therefore, I was usually working on Christmas Eve when the stores on Main Street were open late.

I always looked for Aunt Freda to show up close to closing time to do her last-minute shopping, usually stocking stuffers. I’d help her if I could even though she was usually in a tizzy about getting everything just right for Christmas. She managed to do just that, however, and we enjoyed many happy Christmas afternoons at her farm in Bremen.

If you have some last-minute Christmas shopping to do I have some suggestions.  Most of this information I got from the Courier Gazette site online. This year it is important, because of the economy, to buy locally if you can and try to patronize the smaller stores. Most of these suggestions pertain to local areas in Maine, but the same or similar items could probably be found in whatever area you live in.

Kids

Recently I read about a warehouse-type store in the South End I think, in the Industrial Park. They make homemade toys for kids. I’d check there for unique gifts for kids. There is also a toy store on Main Street and a place called “Out on a Whimsay” in Belfast. They have something called a “Red Tool Box” which has tools to fit small hands and woodworking kits. The Belfast store is at 133 High Street, 207-338-3911.

Gift Cards

Gift cards are always an easy and very appreciated gift. Here’s an unusual place to get one: Union Farm Equipment on Rt. 17 and 31 in Union, 1-800-935-7999. They have cards for $50, $45, and a card worth $100 for just $90. Do you have a gardener or someone who does a vegetable garden every year who would appreciate such a gift?

How about a gift card from your local spa for a special lady on your list? Sogno Salon on Main Street in Rockland, has a deal for 25% off stocking stuffers/travel-size products. Ask them about spa treatments too: 207-594-2422, sognosalon@gmail.com.

Plants

How about a plant for Christmas or a gift card to use in the Spring to purchase bedding flowers? Plants Unlimited also does two trips that would be great gifts. One is the very popular Boston Flower Show on, March 14 and 16. It includes tickets to the show and transportation. Call 207-594-7754 to sign up.

Another trip Plants Unlimited does is the New England International Auto Show, also in Boston. Call the above number for details. Plants Unlimited is on Rt. 1 in Rockport: info@plants-unlimited.com

Crafts

If you are a crafty person, use your talents to make presents for your family and friends. It may be too late to put these items on the last-minute list, but think about it for next year. My sister, Sara, has made me crafty items which I use every day. One is a cloth pouch that sits on my desk to collect the little stuff that clutters things up. I also use the credit card holder she made for me.

If you are into scrapbooking, it could be a good project to do for one particular person every year. Before there was a word known as “scrapbooking” my Grandmother Ida Tolman made all of us kids a personal scrapbook. As I remember, it was done on construction paper of different colors and held together with big rings. In it she put pictures she’d cut out of magazines like the latest cars, family pictures and the like. If I could still find mine today it would serve as a history lesson for that era. I know I must have looked at those pictures a thousand times or more.

Grammie Tolman never bought a Christmas gift for anyone in her life. She made everyone in the family something for Christmas and it’s a big family. It might only be a crocheted doily or a crocheted snowflake which was stiffened with starch, to put on your tree, but many years later many of us still have something she made.

The above-mentioned Aunt Freda also made me an afghan with “Georgia” colors, peach and green and yellow. I treasure it and think of her every time I use it. It’s the last present she ever gave me.

Don’t forget the many Christmas Craft Fairs that abound during this time. Usually the churches hold them. Check the paper for days and times. Often you can find unique gifts to wrap up for Christmas presents.

Art

Visit your local art studios or galleries and get a piece of art for a special person on your list while supporting the artist at the same time.

Baskets

A good present to get someone who has everything is a basket filled with one thing or another. Sometimes they are sweets and candied fruit or sometimes you can get smoked meat products and cheese. Check your local area or the mall near you for holiday baskets. They have the basket to use later also.

A night out or a place to stay

Craignair Inn and Restaurant has a great gift card idea too. It’s good for Friday night burger nights; special dinner events like New Year’s Eve and Valentine’s Day; or for an overnight stay any time of the year. Have guests for the holidays or even in the summertime who would enjoy this gift? Call 207-594-7644, innkeeper@craignair.com.

Online Shopping

It may be too late to do much more shopping online and have your items get to you by Christmas. However, if you do choose this route, check their delivery schedules before you commit to an order. Sometimes they have a one-day shipment or just a few days—if you want to pay extra for it.

Every major store chain has an online site where you can order goods. I would recommend Amazon.com; pottery barn, which has lots of deals; and www.overstocked.com

Overstocked has lots of discounted items and even slightly used or refurbished items, especially electronics, that are really good deals. 

I wish you luck in your last-minute shopping ventures. I have a couple of friends who love to go shopping. They call it “shopping therapy.” I bet they are having a ball shopping for Christmas presents.

By the way, LLBean has needlepoint Christmas stockings on their site. If you want fancy go to their site. While you’re there maybe you’ll find other stuff to buy. Keep it in Maine!

My shopping is done or as much as I’m going to do. I got some good bargains too.

Thanks for listening.

Christmas Decorations on the Sea

 

My niece Brenda sends me a Christmas card every year with a Maine scene on it. This is the one I got this year. I save them and will put them all in a big frame someday. I love getting her card in the mail because it brings back good memories of Christmas in Maine. One day I will spend the holidays in my beloved State of Maine again.

I also found a video on YouTube of a Lobster Boat Parade in Boothbay Harbor. YouTube has a new setup now which makes it difficult for me to upload anything. However here’s the title of the video if you’d like to look at it on YouTube:

Nautica-Boothbay Harbor Lighted Boat Parade 2011.

When I finally do get to spend Christmas at home again, I’d love to see such a boat parade in Rockland Harbor. I don’t know if they have one at the present time. I know that Santa comes in from the sea, so it would be a no-brainer I think to extend those festivities to include a Lighted Lobster Boat Parade.

The Most Decorated Street in America

This street is well known for the cooperation of the residents in making the whole street one big decoration. The video says Hamden, but not sure what state it’s in. However the link is below. Enjoy.

http://youtu.be/_mC8u-ctkh4

From
www.thisolddollinfo/gallery.htm



 

                

A New Doll for Christmas

A story by Sandra Sylvester

A long time ago, maybe longer than even I can remember, there was a little girl who loved dolls. She had a few dolls she played with all day long; playing mother; having tea parties with her tin tea set; lining them all up on her bed and having long conversations with them.

She played with her dolls so much that they were all beginning to look a little raggedy. She had a Raggedy Ann doll, but in her case, all her dolls were raggedy. That didn’t mean she didn’t love them any less. She adored them. She kissed each one good night when she arranged them around her pillow at bedtime. They were all her best friends, her babies.

One day just after Thanksgiving she went grocery shopping with her mother. Friday was grocery shopping day because it was the day her father got paid. After her mother put money away for each of the utility bills—electricity, heating oil, and phone,  and Christmas Club money, which she put into their own separate envelope in her envelope file—she put the rest of the cash in her purse and took the little girl with her up to First National to get the week’s groceries. Her father would join them later after he’d cleaned up from his job at the Cement Plant.

The Christmas Club was a special bank account a lot of mothers had in which they put away two or three dollars a week to save for Christmas presents in December. If they could manage to keep the saving habit up all year, they had quite a bit of money to spend on gifts when the time came. No one had credit cards in those days. The closest thing to it was the layaway plan in which people still paid cash before they could take the item home. Cash was king.

On this particular day the store was already festive with Christmas decorations. Special end-of-aisle displays held Christmas decorations; special Christmas-decorated dishes like candy dishes and Christmas mugs, Christmas candles and the like. But one particular display caught the little girl’s eye right away. It was the prettiest doll she had ever seen.

The doll stood there smiling at her with its little delicate painted lips. Her two arms were extended as if reaching out for the little girl. She stood next to a small decorated artificial Christmas tree with little wrapped presents under it.

 The doll was dressed in a dress of the most beautiful shade of light blue. It was decorated with lace and silver and white ribbons. On top of that she wore the brightest red velvet coat decorated with artificial white fur. She had on a white furry hat and draped over one arm was a muff that matched the coat which also had white fur for decoration. Her white boots were of the same fur as the coat and muff.

The little girl also saw that the doll had blond hair just like she did. She wondered what it would be like to own such a beautiful doll.

She squeezed her mother’s hand and said, “Look, Mama, isn’t she beautiful?”

Her mother said, “Yes, she is, isn’t she.”

Her mother then fingered the price tag and standing back quickly said, “Well let’s go, Dear. We need to get some groceries for Daddy.”

The little girl did as her mother said but she stole one last look at the beautiful doll as she walked down the first aisle hanging on to the grocery cart.

In the few weeks left before Christmas, the little girl stood in front of the doll every Friday and imagined what it would be like to play with her. She even named her. Rosalie. Almost like her own name, Rosie. The store clerks got to expect her every week and thought she was so cute when she talked to “her” doll, Rosalie.

Rosie dreaded the day after Christmas when she knew the doll would be gone, maybe into the home of some other little girl. She had looked at the price tag too. The cost was over $20 which was a lot of money for her family in 1952. Her father had been out of work for a few weeks before Thanksgiving because of a strike at the plant. The family was just now getting caught up and money for Christmas was going to be tight. Even at her young age, she knew that owning that doll was probably a big impossibility and that even Santa might not be able to bring it to her.

Rosie’s mother noticed how much her little girl adored that doll, but she didn’t think her small Christmas Club money this year would allow her to spend that much money on one gift for just Rosie. There were three other kids in the family after all and she didn’t want anyone to be left out because of one gift.

The mother wished that the store wouldn’t make the doll look so pretty sitting up there in a prominent place where every little girl going by would see it. This community was not a rich one and she imagined there was more than one little girl who would love to have that doll for Christmas and would be disappointed when they didn’t get it.

Well, she thought, there’s always the dime bank.

The dime bank was a glass jar in the shape of a bear she kept sitting on the shelf above her kitchen sink. It used to hold honey at one time. When she had dimes left over from shopping trips, she’d put them in the jar. Many times she had designated that money for a specific item she wanted to buy. Well, maybe this time it could be for the doll.

It was close to Christmas though and she didn’t know if she had enough money in the dime jar to cover the cost of the doll. She decided to wait till the last minute to buy the doll if she could so that the dimes would accumulate as much as possible.

Meanwhile, Rosie continued to talk to her new doll, Rosalie, every time she went to the grocery store with her mother. The store manager even knew about Rosie and her doll after a while. He smiled because he had a little girl about her age and he was thinking of getting her that doll for Christmas.

On the last weekend before Christmas the mother left Rosie at home with her big sister so she could try to make a deal with the manager about the doll. She only had half of the money needed and hoped to be able to give the store the rest in installments after Christmas.

When she went into the store she went to look at the doll one more time before deciding whether to get it or not. She looked in the spot where the display was and the doll was gone.

Oh, no, where is it, she thought. Rosie is going to be so disappointed. Well, I don’t think she really expected to get that expensive doll for Christmas anyway. Maybe it’s for the best.

Suddenly she felt someone at her shoulder and turned around to see the manager. She knew him as he went to the same church as her family did.

“Where’s Rosie today,” he said. “She always likes to look at ‘her’ doll every time you come in.”

“Oh, I left her at home. I wanted to try to get that doll for her but I see it’s gone. Did you sell all of them?”

“Actually we only had a few and we just sold the last one today. However, I do expect some more to come in the day before Christmas. Would you like me to save one for you?”

“Well…I don’t know,” she said. “I really don’t have enough money to buy it. I was hoping to be able to put it on a layaway plan or something and pay you each week after Christmas so she’d have it for Christmas day…but I guess that’s probably a little bit too much to ask…”

“You know what,” he said. “I know things have been tough for you this year. It’s been bad for everyone what with the strike and all. I don’t see why we can’t make some kind of a deal. That’s depending on whether the new shipment gets here in time. Let’s cross our fingers OK. And don’t worry about the money, we’ll figure out something. Check back with me the day before Christmas.”

The mother left the store with her groceries hoping that maybe she could really make her little girl’s dream come true. She didn’t tell her husband about the doll. He would feel awful if he knew how much his little girl wanted that special doll. That doll represented hope for a better year for the family. If she could put that doll under the tree for Christmas, the light shining in her little girl’s eyes would be the best Christmas present any family could have.

Those last few days before Christmas seemed to go by so slow for Rosie. School was closed for the Christmas holiday and the weather became bad. A nor’easter hit the coast and everyone was struggling to make last minute preparations for Christmas. After that storm came another storm, of icy sleet. Things went from bad to worse.

Rosie’s mother was worried that the special shipment with the dolls in it might not make it up the two lane highway to town in those trucks which had to go up and down some very steep hills before they arrived.

On Christmas morning Rosie awoke to sun coming into her bedroom window. The ice on top of the snow outside shone like a blanket of twinkling Christmas lights. It was beautiful…and at last it was Christmas.

She snuck downstairs ahead of everyone else to see what Santa might have left under the tree for her. She expected to have only one or two gifts this year. She hadn’t even asked for anything special because she knew her mother would be sad if she couldn’t get it for her. She’d be happy with what she got she decided. Next year would be better she knew.

She looked under the tree and stared in awe at the big red ribbon draped over her doll Rosalie. She was really here in her own home. She could reach out and touch her and hold her and rock her to sleep. It had to be the best Christmas she ever had. She didn’t care if there was not another thing under the tree for her. Rosalie had gotten adopted by one very special girl.

“Merry Christmas, Rosalie,” she said. “Merry Christmas and welcome home.”

 

P.S. This story is a work of fiction no matter how much one little girl might think it’s about her.

Christmas in the Big Apple

This Christmas our thoughts go to those who suffered in the recent hurricane, Sandy, in the greater New York area and the Jersey Shore. When such a storm hits in such a populated area, probably one of the most populated in the world, and certainly in America, the long-term recovery is daunting.

I have visited New York City, the Big Apple, many times, but never during the Christmas holiday period. Someday I hope to do that…it’s on my bucket wish list. I have never not had a good time when I visited this wonderful city. To a Maineiac and a little girl from the South End, the city holds many magical moments and non more during the Christmas holidays.

I hope you will all remember these folks this Christmas by supporting one of the many relief funds, particularly, the Red Cross. These other two sites will also guide you to the charity of your choice for Sandy relief. In New York go to: www.charitynavigator.org. For the Jersey Shore go to: https://sandyrelieffund.org.

To remind you of what New York City has to offer during the Christmas season, I offer these images from Christmases past. You will never see these images anywhere else in the country. I found them all on a google search for Christmas in New York City.  Enjoy.