The "A Few Of My Favorite Gifts: Sub-Head - And We Laughed And Laughed" Story

It was an ordinary day.  Christmas morning 2019.  Our friends from State College had just arrived and we ushered them into our living room to exchange presents.  Jere and Sue, classmates of mine from the Manheim Township High School class of 1962, had plans to come to Lancaster to visit with Jere's sister and family and called to see if they could stop to exchange a few gifts the following day.  At this point I must digress and bring you up to date with my past.  Year was in the late 1940s, Christmas day, and my parents and brother and I went to visit my grandmother and aunt (on my father's side) to exchange Christmas gifts.  Aunt Doris surprised me with a new Schwinn bicycle!  Loved Aunt Doris!  Fast forward with me now to mid to late 1950s and I came down the stairs Christmas morning in our home on North Queen Street to find my parents had bought me a new 3-speed bike with hand brakes.  Wasn't more than a few hours later that I took my bike for a ride and stopped at the local candy store, "Eli's", to show Eli my new bike.  He was as amazed as I was about the bike.  Told me to be careful going home on it.  Well, I had to stop quickly at an intersection and mistakenly pulled on the right-hand brake and flew over the front of the bike.  Scratched the handlebar, but was able to hide it so my parents didn't see the scratch.  My next memorable Christmas gift was a 120-bass accordion that mom and dad got me when I was about 14 years old.  Heavy for a skinny young boy, but I loved playing it.  My teacher was a guy by the name of Mickey Sinopoli who had the coolest name and could play the neatest songs on the accordion.  I wanted to be just like him, but after my Spring concert and barely being able to hold the accordion to play "Lady of Spain" for the audience, I quit the accordion.  Along came 1960 and my parents bought me a set of spun-aluminum hubcaps, known as Moon hubcaps, for Christmas for my 1953 Henry J automobile. Didn't take long to get to the car to pop them in place.  I was once again in heaven due to a fabulous Christmas gift.  Well, today wasn't quite as memorable as the days I have just described, but it certainly made me laugh a bit more, for you see I opened a gift from Jere And Sue which was a framed caricature of myself riding a bicycle once again.  The story behind it goes like this.....  This past September, Carol and I traveled with Jere and Sue to the island of Antigua.  During one of our many talks during our evening meal I told them a story that happened during my youth.  At the time I had raised guinea pigs to sell (now that's another story I believe I already told) for a few years and had an arrangement with the nearby Acme Supermarket to save lettuce trimmings for me to feed to my guinea pigs, which numbered close to 75 at the time.  Once or twice a week I would hook a little red wagon to my three-speed bike and head up North Market Street in my sandals to pick up the lettuce.  As I rode my bike I would pull out a cigarette I had taken from my parent's pack of cigs and puffed on it.  Made me look older, so it did!  At least to me, it did.  It was then that one of the others asked what kind of cigarettes I smoked when I was riding my bike.  "I smoked Newports," was my answer, since that's what my mom smoked.  That just about got us thrown out of the place from all the laughter.  One day my mom told me she and dad had something to talk to me about.  Uh, Oh!  I thought they had found my "Playboy" magazine I had between the mattress and box spring.  "We found a few cigarettes in your room and we're concerned about you smoking," Mom told me.  "You know that Grandpap smokes a pipe and we thing it best if you have to smoke, you should smoke a pipe."  Fine with me.  

LDub as a young boy drawn by Mike

Well, by now my story I was telling the other three at our table in the restaurant in Antigua was creating a few more laughs.  I then described how I would ride my bike and wagon to the supermarket with a pipe in my mouth, puffing away as I rode up N. Market Street.  Well, to finish my Christmas story about neat gifts, today I opened a gift from Jere and Sue and found a caricature of myself riding a bicycle with a pipe in my mouth and a cigarette behind my ear and wearing sandals.  Seems Jere's nephew Mike is an artist and does great caricature drawings so Sue called him and gave him my description and he drew one of my gifts that I was given by Jere and Sue.  The laughing was once again out-of-control.   I know...you had to be there to appreciate it!  So, I would be amiss if I didn't add this gift as one of the Christmas gifts that I will remember for the rest of my life.  It was another extraordinary day in the life of an ordinary guy.