William O'Boyle: Beyond the Byline: Keep those holiday traditions going

Nov. 28—WILKES-BARRE — Well, toilet-seat Santa is back on my front door, and my well-lighted tree will be in my front window this evening.

All I need now is an oval spiced ham sandwich and a bowl of tomato soup.

The snow on the ground this morning got me hankering for all those things, so I decided to fire up the Way Back Machine and head again to those days gone by — of Douglas firs, Plasticville villages, heirloom Christmas ornaments, and yes, oval spiced ham sandwiches.

These are memories of long ago that are embedded in my memory bank and when I think about them, it makes me smile and that is a good thing — especially right after I fill my car's gas tank.

So the Way Back Machine has landed, and I'm looking around my living room. The Douglas fir is in the corner of the front room, all decorated and with multi-colored lights and an angel on top. The Plasticville village is below, with the Lionel train chugging around — whistle blowing and bells ringing.

Perfectly wrapped Christmas presents are stacked to one side, waiting for company to come a-calling. Soon there will be the aroma of home cooking throughout the house and a small table will be set up to place cookies and milk for Santa when he arrives.

It's Christmas Eve, but the days leading up to this day are filling my mind. In a split second, I'm back to my grade-school days and coming home for lunch. I would sit on the left side of our couch, which had wooden arms, and wait for my mom to bring me the day's delicacy.

More days than not — when tuna fish was not on special — it was a sandwich consisting of two slices of fresh white bread, a slice of cheese and, yes, a couple slices of that oval spiced ham.

Sometimes mom added mayonnaise, other days it was mustard. And the sandwich was always accompanied by soup — my favorite was Campbell's tomato soup with a splash of milk.

And I usually dunked the sandwich in the soup. To a 9-year-old kid, this was fine dining.

Some days, mom would serve up tuna fish sandwiches and a cup of tea. I preferred the tomato soup, but either way, I always dunked.

These lunches were especially satisfying on the days we would have a snowstorm, and we would walk through a foot or two or more of the white stuff — uphill both ways for a mile or more — to get to school. And we would walk home for lunch and back for the afternoon session. And we would walk home, as well.

Once home, and before dinner, we would go out and play in the snow. We would build a fort or an igloo. We would embrace Mother Nature and her beautiful snow. We welcomed it with open arms, covered in a warm winter coat and gloves, of course.

We never knew what a snow day was. Of course, these were the pre-consolidation days when school buses were only used to transport athletic teams to away games. We actually attended school every day, and we never found ourselves glued to the television screen, gazing wide-eyed until we saw "Plymouth Borough Schools, closed today" or "2-hour delay." That just never happened.

We actually enjoyed trudging to school through high snow. We would throw snowballs at each other most of the way. It was fun.

The cloakrooms at Central Elementary School were packed with snow-covered coats and boots. For the first hour or so, our cheeks would remain rosy red until we warmed up from the coal-fired furnaces below our rooms.

After school and after supper, we would go sledding. From the top of Nottingham Street, across Second Street, down we went, across First Street, all the way to Shawnee Avenue. We would have lookouts at each intersection to warn us of traffic. But if we managed an uninterrupted ride from the top to the bottom, it was so worth the climb back up for another thrill run.

Sometimes, we had to deal with obstacles, like ashes from coal furnaces that would be thrown on the roadway to help with traction. Sometimes, we would cover them up or move them out of the way. After all, most people had snow tires — some with spikes in them — and others, including my dad, would put chains on the rear tires. If I try hard enough, I can still hear the sound of tire chains on the road.

All of these wonderful memories of snowy winters and hot lunches came rushing back one day years ago when I was standing in a supermarket deli line when a woman ordered a half-pound of oval spiced ham.

We had so many traditions back in the day.

Christmas carols were always playing on the radio, and it was always snowing outside. After Christmas Eve dinner, we cleaned up and got ready to go to midnight Mass.

Friends and family are there. We all are happy to see each other. We pray together. We hope together. We celebrate together.

That's all we hope for in 2021.

And an oval spiced ham sandwich would be nice.

Reach Bill O'Boyle at 570-991-6118 or on Twitter @TLBillOBoyle, or email at [email protected]