Aging nearly seven decades forces nostalgic memories of past yuletide seasons:
The brightly decorated real and ersatz trees, copious presents, delicious turkey dinners and the exciting visits to and from relatives and friends.
And nothing reinforces those memories more than the 1983 motion picture, A Christmas Story—the best holiday flick ever produced.
Forget It’s a Wonderful Life. That tear-jerker has no relevance to reality for most of us. A Christmas Story does.
The Editor—a bespectacled Ralphie clone-- vividly remembers watching electric trains whistling along tracks in the windows of department stores, standing in line to visit Santa Claus, pining for (and getting) a Red Ryder BB gun and ripping open carefully wrapped presents.
And the coal-fired furnaces, overloaded electrical sockets and rumors of snowflakes, even in Southern California. (26 DECEMBER 2004)
