Best/Worst Christmas you ever had?

[AnthonyO'Brien]

Merry Christmas everyone!

I guess a lot of my Christmases have a been a mix of good and bad. Dec 23, 2007 I fell off a roof onto concrete and busted my arm and wrist, coulda been worse I guess, sent Christmas day and the day after in hospital and recieved a few visits from my sisters before being unexpectedly airlifted to Melbourne for surgery spending my Australian summer in a cast.

My 2021 Christmas should be OK. Im at my sisters place (she has a heated swimming pool) with a few other siblings plus their kids.

And YOU?

[batnbreakfast]

May I ask why you fell off a roof? Are you a catburglar? Were you ChevyChaseIng Christmas lights onto your home?

[AnthonyO'Brien]

Thanks for asking. I was tidying up at my sister's old address and boy, was her house FILTHY! Although they had a tourist cafe they ran downstairs upstairs was a mess with meat cleavers and dog poop on the living room carpet, mould on the windows, grease stains on the walls and a big screen Tv blaring away with no one watching it.
The family situation was awkward too. Sis and her hubby had just gotten back after a separation and her daughters had turned into anti social teenagers. There was no one for me to talk to so I cleaned up her house again. I was gonna clean the bathroom but the eldest teen daughter was in the shower so I climbed up on a ladder to clean a window. Tried holding onto a rotting wooden beam for support and...
Peeled myself off the concrete and went into the house with my "wet noodle" arm. My sis showed some responsibility and rang the hospital to make an emergency appointment. As always it took nearly an hour to get through and arrange something. And my niece was STILL in the shower a hour later!!! So yeah worst Christmas

Never went back to that place and was years before I spoke to them again. They've matured a little bit since then and my sis currently has a broken leg this christmas. It rains on the just and unjust alike I guess...

[Tien Long]

My best Christmas? Christmas 1994. That was just a really great Christmas all-around. I remember it being cold, white Christmas with thick snow on the ground. The presents that year were awesome too. As an avid reader of Game Players video game magazines, I had read reviews for months of a bunch of games that were coming out. The four that I wanted the most were X-Men: Mutant Apocalypse, Samurai Shodown, Mortal Kombat II, and Donkey Kong Country. One day in early November while we were in the mall, I had pestered my mom to get me the games. In frustration, she pointed to an ever green decoration in a store window and said, "When all of THOSE are around, then we get it!"

Fast forward to Christmas night. Again, it was a great cold Christmas night. My family had gone over to my aunt's house. I don't remember if they were in individual packages or wrapped together, but yes I got those four games. That Christmas evening was the best too. I got up late and night tested Donkey Kong Country. Eventually, I'd play all of the games over the winter break. And for many, many years afterwards. Yep, those games gave a lot of great memories.

Yes, I was spoiled that Christmas. I'll admit I acted pretty spoiled in asking for them. Those games were expensive. But I won't say sorry for their enjoyment. Or those memories. Indeed, I contrast that with what Christmas has become today. My games were given to my cousins years ago. The mall I pestered my mom in is now at half capacity with many stored boarded up, partially due to Covid and partially due to shoppers finding deals online. Cold, snowy winters in the NY/NJ region are slowly becoming quaint. Tomorrow's high is supposed to be 60 something degrees. I've become older too. The weight of 27 years ago is slowly dawning on me. What I thought my future would be back in 1994 hasn't turned out like that. There have been regrets.

But I keep going. Still hold out for a great life and the next great Christmas.

[CSTowle]

Christmas 1988 for me. Woke up to find my first NES (we were a little on the poor side, by US standards, so got things a bit behind the times but god bless mom we did get them) along with several games. My favorite was "Wizards & Warriors" (a universally hated game I've learned since then, but I loved it as it was easy and fantasy-based), but also had Mario/Duck Hunt, Iron Tank, and a few others that escape me. She also got me a plastic breastplate/sword combo thing and I remember enjoying that quite a bit.

Worst would be 1994, not bad by universal standards but we ended up moving to a different state and while we didn't have money for a lot of presents it was worse more for not having close contact with friends to share everything with (including just hanging out). I was slow to make friends (still am), so at that point I had nobody but family. No injuries though, nothing like Phoebe Cates in "Gremlins" or anything like that.

[AnthonyO'Brien]

1989 was a good one for me. It had a good vibe to it. I was 16, a good age and the presents and party at my brothers back yard went well. I left with another sister to go to her country town and saw an amazing lightening storm over the city from the freeway bridge.

1984 sucked though. Mum died on Dec 14 when I was 11. Funeral was a week before christmas. It was my last day of primary (elementary) school. I had to clean out my locker and go to the service. The Christmas day itself was good though with a nice dinner and prezzies. Found $20 at a cricket match the next day so I realised life wasnt always gonna be bad...

[CaptCleghorn]

I've been incredibly blessed as I've never really had a "bad" Christmas. My best was a year in the late 1990's when my son's face brightened up not at his gift but seeing his mother open the gift he got for her. That told me he had a much better handle on the holiday than I did at his age.

[seismic-2]

Best: just about all of them when I was a young child, for the usual reasons.

Worst: when I spent all 24 hours of December 25 sitting and sleeping fitfully in a chair beside my mother's bed, as she lay dying in Hospice

Most interesting: when I was in college, those of us who were spending vacation in our dorm decided to dispose of the Christmas tree, which had completely dried out and was shedding terribly. Instead of tossing it into a dumpster, we decided to take it out into the courtyard and burn it. Almost as soon as the lighted match touched it, it just about exploded in flame. Within seconds the fire shot up as high as the windows on the second floor. In less than a minute all that was left was just a charred stick. All of us gained an appreciation of why there are forest fires that cause so much devastation in dry seasons.