Where were you in '82?

My friend Jay sent me this link to the 1982 Sears Wish Book. It used to be that nothing said Christmas like the Sears Wish Book. I would pour over every page, create a list, check it twice and then reconfigure. I learned early that page number and item number were important on my list!

1982--wow, that is when J.Geils was singing about his baby in the Centerfold and I had no idea what he meant just that I'd heard the video was naughty but I liked the beat. I was eight years old and in the 2nd grade. I loved Joan Jett's "I love Rock 'n' Roll" and sang it with my friends in the back of Molly's wagon queen family truckster (y'all know the wagon with the wood paneling and the cool 3rd row seats that faced each other). Good times.

1982--I received the bunk bed doll beds from the Sears Wishbook. A mon-chi-chi, a doll named Kimberly with striped knee socks and roller skates and the Barbie Motorhome. Seeing that motorhome reminded me that 1982 was the year I found out about Santa (and not that he had flying reindeer and said 'ho-ho-ho'). I believe I kept it from my parents more worried that they'd be disappointed that I knew than being disappointed that I knew. Funny.

It's this time of year that I like to read Yes Virginia, There is a Santa Claus (posted below). It keeps the magic alive and living it through Miss F's eyes is so much fun. I like when she's whining to start singing "You better watch out...." and she stops. She was touching the tree the other day (a big no-no) and I said "Santa is watching" and she jumped a mile and ran away. I love seeing her face light up when she sees Santa or a reindeer or even when she calls the baby Jesus "Aidan" (side note: at church today the children's message leader asked a whole group of children, "Now, who's name begins with 'J'?" and they all shouted "Jacob!")


Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus

Eight-year-old Virginia O'Hanlon wrote a letter to the editor of New York's Sun, and the quick response was printed as an unsigned editorial Sept. 21, 1897. The work of veteran newsman Francis Pharcellus Church has since become history's most reprinted newspaper editorial, appearing in part or whole in dozens of languages in books, movies, and other editorials, and on posters and stamps.

"DEAR EDITOR: I am 8 years old. "Some of my little friends say there is no Santa Claus. "Papa says, 'If you see it in THE SUN it's so.' "Please tell me the truth; is there a Santa Claus?"VIRGINIA O'HANLON."115 WEST NINETY-FIFTH STREET.

"VIRGINIA, your little friends are wrong. They have been affected by the skepticism of a skeptical age. They do not believe except [what] they see. They think that nothing can be which is not comprehensible by their little minds. All minds, Virginia, whether they be men's or children's, are little. In this great universe of ours man is a mere insect, an ant, in his intellect, as compared with the boundless world about him, as measured by the intelligence capable of grasping the whole of truth and knowledge.Yes, VIRGINIA, there is a Santa Claus. He exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist, and you know that they abound and give to your life its highest beauty and joy. Alas! how dreary would be the world if there were no Santa Claus. It would be as dreary as if there were no VIRGINIAS. There would be no childlike faith then, no poetry, no romance to make tolerable this existence. We should have no enjoyment, except in sense and sight. The eternal light with which childhood fills the world would be extinguished.Not believe in Santa Claus! You might as well not believe in fairies! You might get your papa to hire men to watch in all the chimneys on Christmas Eve to catch Santa Claus, but even if they did not see Santa Claus coming down, what would that prove? Nobody sees Santa Claus, but that is no sign that there is no Santa Claus. The most real things in the world are those that neither children nor men can see. Did you ever see fairies dancing on the lawn? Of course not, but that's no proof that they are not there. Nobody can conceive or imagine all the wonders there are unseen and unseeable in the world.You may tear apart the baby's rattle and see what makes the noise inside, but there is a veil covering the unseen world which not the strongest man, nor even the united strength of all the strongest men that ever lived, could tear apart. Only faith, fancy, poetry, love, romance, can push aside that curtain and view and picture the supernal beauty and glory beyond. Is it all real? Ah, VIRGINIA, in all this world there is nothing else real and abiding. No Santa Claus! Thank God! he lives, and he lives forever. A thousand years from now, Virginia, nay, ten times ten thousand years from now, he will continue to make glad the heart of childhood.