A Very Wild Christmas Memory from 1977

 A Very Wild (and Practical) Christmas Morning in Our One-Level House

December Christmas, 25th, 1977.

Wow! Christmas morning was... well, it was definitely different this year. I ran to the living room in our little three-bedroom, one-level house to see what Santa brought, and there was a race car track! And a Captain America comic book! Those were awesome.

But then I saw a letter. It was addressed to me, and it was from SANTA! But it wasn't a happy, "Ho ho ho!" letter. This one was a little... serious. He said he'd noticed that I was really good at losing my gloves, hats, and even my coat. So, he said, until I got better at keeping track of my things, he wasn't going to leave me any more toys.

Instead, my stocking was stuffed FULL of gloves! And hats! And even some warm, fuzzy socks. It was kind of a lot of gloves and hats.

But then I saw a big box in the living room. It was heavy! Inside, there was a really nice, thick, winter coat. Mom said Santa knew how cold it gets in Flagstaff during the winter, and this would help keep me warm on those chilly days and freezing nights. It was a really good coat, even if it wasn't a toy.

And you know what else was really neat? My cousins, [mention their names if you like], gave our whole family a "record." It's this big, flat, square thing, and they said their band, called Wild Country, made it themselves! They only made, like, a hundred of them, just for people they knew. That's even rarer than my Captain America!

Mom put the record on this big, spinning thing called a "turntable" that was part of our stereo in the living room. It made this little scratchy sound when the needle went down, and then... MUSIC! It was different than the Elvis records Dad always plays, or the twangy country songs Mom likes. This was... well, it was Wild Country!

I remember sitting right in front of the big speakers with my brother/sister [mention their names if applicable], trying to figure out all the sounds. There was a guitar that went twang-a-lang, and someone singing with a voice that sounded kinda like Dad when he's happy. Some of the songs were fast and made you want to bounce around, and others were slower, like when we're driving home late at night.

My cousins were on the cover of the record! They looked a little bit like cowboys, but with longer hair. It was so cool to think that people we actually KNEW were making real music that we could listen to whenever we wanted. Dad said this was a "vinyl" record and that it was special because it was one of their very first ones, from before they got really famous and changed their name to something about a state. But this Wild Country record? This was ours. A Christmas gift made with love, just for us. I bet it's going to be played a LOT in our house! Maybe one day I'll even learn all the words.

So, yeah, Christmas was... interesting. Santa was a little bit grumpy about my lost things, but I got a super warm coat and a really cool record from my cousins. Maybe if I'm extra careful with my gloves and hats this year, next Christmas will have more toys AND music in our one-level Flagstaff house!