Blue Christmas

"I'll have a blue Christmas without you. I'll be so blue thinking about you. Decorations of red on a green Christmas tree...."

Right about there, my dad asked me to stop singing that song and to never sing it again. He hadn't done that before and since my voice was pretty good, I was a bit surprised. He explained.

Years ago when he was a young Navy Seabee stationed on the island of Guam he had his first Christmas away from home. He was a Blue Ridge Mountain boy and Christmas for him meant family and home and cold weather and all the things he was used to. My grandparents were very poor and presents were not even part of the picture, but Dad missed Christmas. Instead he was building roads, and guarding Japanese prisoners of war on a tropical island thousands of miles away. He told of how the prisoners begged for a weapon in order to kill themselves because of their lost honor at being captured. Hard things for a young man to see and hear.

Fast forward to the 50s and that Elvis song and it tore at my dad's heart and reminded him of those hard days on Guam. Christmas music would make him cry tears for the boys who wouldn't get to come home.

This year the ladies of GLCC are packaging cookies to send to our deployed men and women. They won't be able to be with their families, but they CAN get a little box of goodies that says "home" and might just help take the Christmas blues away...even for a short time.

December 9th from 7-9pm

GLCC gym

5$ admission to cover shipping costs

Finger food to share