My fellow forum guys - if you don't mind thought I'd share a pic from Christmas Eve 1961. My older bro snapped this photo with us showing our gifts...ahh that's me wielding a rather real looking 38 revolver! The pic just strikes at the heart when my now dear departed folks were still in the prime of their lives. The scene is just surreal to me - a perfect Christmas scene, a real tree with the old fashioned tinsel. I hadn't viewed this photo, or don't recall when I might have, until going through my mom's things after she passed away just before Christmas 2015. My dad was about 10 years older than my mom; he passed in 2011 at age 94. Mom made it to 89. They met at work, American Can Co, not long before my dad went into the service in '45. He was deferred from the draft as his tool & die skills kept him working home bound designing and refurbishing ammo dies. When the war ended he got his notice quick to enter and went to Japan as part of the occupied forces. Well, we all have our remembrances and life goes on; but it's a pic like this that takes me back to another time and to revisit the loss of the folks.
