Holiday on Ice

Christmas IS very much about memories; the older you get, the truer that becomes.  Saw this video on a friend's wall on Facebook. Her comment was that this is what happens when you decide to wear the "cute" boots rather than the ones that are really made for the weather.  I had to laugh.

Because instantly into my mind came the holiday season of 1975.  (Husband and I started our courtship between Thanksgiving and Christmas of that year...he proposed to me on New Years Eve.)  Every evening after work, young husband-to-be would shower, don his nicest jeans, his smartest shirt (unbuttoned nearly to his navel :) ) and his most expensive pair of  dress boots and drive over to my house to...well, to do whatever it was young, start-struck lovers could do at her parent's house.  Sometimes we'd go out for a dinner or snack, sometimes we'd stay home and watch TV or listen to music. 

At the end of the evening, I'd walk him to the door and kiss him goodnight, then stand at the door and watch him walk out to his car.  And every night, he'd get about halfway down the sidewalk, his legs would fly out from under him, and he'd land flat on his ass.  And I would call, "Are you okay?"  And he'd say, "Yeah," scramble to his feet and slide the last ten feet to his car.   This happened, like clockwork, just about every time he attempted that crossing when the walk was icy. 

Oh, he had snow boots.  He wore them to work every day.  But they were just not acceptable date-wear.  He would take his chances with the slick-bottomed dress boots.  Every night.  And land on his ass in the snow.  Every night.  Risk his life for fashion.  Every night.

I suppose it's a miracle he didn't end up with a cracked skull or in the hospital in traction.  But...hey...  He was nineteen years old.  We all know that nineteen-year-olds are indestructible.  At least, they think so.  

It was hilarious, forty years ago.  In retrospect, it's...still hilarious.