Our readers write — letters to the editor

Recent cartoon found offensive
To The Editor:
I was terribly disappointed, hurt and angry at the large, square “cartoon” on page four in the Dec. 14 paper.
It was very insulting to anyone who is a Christian and knows the reason for the season, which, of course, is Jesus’ birth.
In the cartoon, Santa was holding a small child, pointing back at a nativity scene and calling Jesus a “Bloke.” I looked the word up in a dictionary and it means “oaf,” “chap,” “joker,” “bugger” and “fellow.”
May the artist, whose name I could not read, ask for forgiveness when he faces God someday.
Carolyn Clark
South Fulton

Difficult times
spark memories

To The Editor:
Listen up, you parents and grandparents, who have been begged by youngsters for Santa to bring them iPods or iPhones or whatever, and the students are not even out of junior high.
Please tell them some of this true story: They may have been told something of the current recession, that they can’t have certain things due to the bad money situation. Even with Momma working, the money just doesn’t go that far. Well, tell them all about the time I had 50 cents, with which to buy gifts for six family members and hope to have enough left over to get a gift for the girl whose name I had drawn for the school gift exchange... sad, but true.
This was in the early 1930s.
My brother and I made it. At that time, you could get a Coke for 5 cents, before the advent of radios, and corn and cotton did not come in (due to drought or some such), and yeah, we just had it rough.
Our father had lost our family business, Patton’s Place, as he could not collect the debts owed by farmers or sharecroppers. We had been able to become the agents to sell Dixie Greyhound bus tickets, so that helped a little. The store had been a short-order cafe, combined with groceries, and simple drugs, like Lydia Pinkham’s pills and Doan’s Little Liver Pills.
Dad had given a man in his church his private insurance policy, in exchange for money to try to stay in business, to no avail. Sound like a fairy tale?
Brother and I went shopping at the Union City dime store. Yes, we found something suitable for all the five family members and I recall finding a nice “amethyst” string of beads for the girl in my class. But woe is me! Neither of us could find anything we could afford for our mother.
Each of us had a few pennies left. I was fortunate to see a small four-inch “goat” with wood match-stick legs and two black felt ears sticking up. Eureka! Mother would love that. We pooled our pennies and were happy to have finished our shopping.
Now to the funny: We were the laughing stock of the entire family. A “goat” for Mother? Yes. Forever after, when we had a gift for anyone in the family, and they asked what it was, we always laughed, and said, “Why, it’s a goat.”
’Nuff said.
Edith Senn
Troy
Published in The Messenger 12.23.09

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