Memory is a fascinating function of the brain. It’s especially curious when two people share the same experience, but carry somewhat different versions with them into the future.

For example, a Christmas shopping trip in December 1963, with Dad as my shopping buddy. Destination: downtown Pittsfield, Massachusetts.

(After 1963, Mom always took me Christmas shopping. It was a treat. We would stop by Rosa Restaurant on North Street “for a bite,” as Mom would say.)

It never occurred to me that Dad and Mom didn’t have to arm wrestle or at least draw straws to select who would have the honor of taking me shopping. After 1963, I think maybe Dad put his foot down.

My recollection is that we had a wonderful time.

Mom was pregnant with Bill at the time, so that means I was five years old. After putting in a full day at the office at the local General Electric plant, Dad took me by the mittened hand and we headed downtown.

After several hours of exploring every inch of England Brothers Department Store and J.J. Newberry’s, I informed Dad (who dutifully held my purse during crucial times) that I had some thinking to do and was ready to go home. Gift selection for family members, like fine wine, would take some time.

Mom could never tell the rest of the story without laughing so hard she could barely get the words out: “Dad walked through the front door and collapsed in a chair. ‘We didn’t get a thing,’ he pronounced. ‘Not one thing!'”

Apparently, I broke my Dad.

The next week, Mom took me shopping and we finished up lickety split. It’s all about preparation and pacing.

This became such a family story that big brother Harry used it for a school assignment, which resurfaced recently in our family archives:

In case you can’t read his writing (the nuns taught us the Palmer Method, as I recall), here it is all typed out for you:

My Sister’s Christmas Shopping Trip

My sister, Paula, went shopping with my father. Paula played “Row, Row, Row Your Boat” on a tiny piano. She started to play an organ. Paula started winding jack-in-the-boxes and music boxes. She wound a toy donkey’s tail. Every binoculars or telescope she saw she looked through. Paula was going up an escalator, she and Dad holding the pocketbook. Then she let go.

She saw a miniature rocking horse. Paula pulled a string, it rocked and went “heeee-heeee.” Though all this fuss, they didn’t come home with any Christmas presents.

As you can see in this photo from Christmas Day, no one did without.

See those three glowing balls near the bottom of the Christmas tree (on the right side of the above photo)? Those were Snowball Lights from General Electric. I’m not sure exactly what the “snow” material was, but it felt like Styrofoam. It flaked off and ground into the carpeting, along with the dried out pine needles from the tree.

More modern versions are promoted as “cool bulbs” but the ’60s prototype gave off the heat of a thousand suns.

Nowadays, quite a bit of my Christmas shopping is accomplished online. But still, it’s fun to go shopping with Gary here in southern Indiana and across the river in Owensboro. Oftentimes he and I come home without a single package. But we’re always sure to bring home the important stuff: wonderful memories.

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