Holiday Traditions

My favourite tradition which I lost when I lost my father was shopping for my mom. It started when I was in Grade 3.  First, my mom would make the list. Then my mom would take me downtown with the list and I would meet my dad at work. He had a route. One that kept us strictly underground so we didn’t need our coats. We bought everything on the list plus her annual new suit and a new nightie if she needed it or not.  There were also a few oddities that would strike my father’s imagination. As I grew older, I would have to try everything on and model, even the nightie. A few clerks at Eaton’s were uncomfortable serving us although it never occurred to me that they thought I was out with my sugar daddy.

After shopping my Dad and I would go out for dinner. Always somewhere very fancy…Winston’s Hy’s, the Imperial Room at the Royal York Hotel. Each year when the waiter came by my father would order for me, "She’ll have a Shirley Temple, and the most expensive thing on the menu" Which was usually true because I usually had lobster.

We did this ever year for 21 years. The people at Dad’s office would come to expect me. I moved from Shirley Temples to a glass of wine to Vodka and sodas. I expanded beyond lobster and the last year we went out, Winston’s had re-opened temporarily and we split the beef wellington with Antoine’s pate.  That was 4 weeks before my dad’s nosebleed that led to the leukemia diagnosis.

These nights were more festive and Christmasy to me than any other moment of the season and although my brother tried to pick up the slack for a couple of years, it’s never really seemed like Christmas to me since.

When I sat down to write this, I was planning on listing a whole bunch of fun holiday traditions but as I wrote the very first that came to mind, there didn’t seem to be room in the same post for anything else. I’ll include more uplifting traditions tomorrow. Please share some of yours.

P. S. Here is a visual from Jackie’s Clothes.

Fabulous Fashions by appointment