Family December Reflections

I think it is likely that everyone has something in their family history that is interesting, unusual or significant. You just have to dig around to excavate these stories.

Storytelling is really what we are doing when we reveal parts of our life journey.

One of the significant things about my family was how many of us were born around Christmas. Was there something in the water? Or just a lot of friskiness in March and April?

Dad leads off this tale of Yuletide births. He was born on Christmas Day in 1928. Mom was born on the day after Christmas in 1930. I do wonder what that conversation was like when they were getting to know each other and it came up.

So my parents married in 1951 and along came the firstborn, my sister Leslie. Want to take a guess on what day? Christmas Eve! So now you have a happy little family with a trio of Christmas birthdays, one after the other.

I came next, three years later in 1955. Late in the year it was when people were shopping and preparing for the big holiday. I imagine my mother was both aghast and amused at the projected birthdate of December 25.

Okay everyone, calm down! I didn’t come into the world on that joyous occasion. And I missed the mark on a streak of continuous birthdays. Can you imagine if it had been December 23 or 27? 

But it was close enough. My arrival was December 15. 

Growing up there were a lot of combined birthday and Christmas cards and gifts. I can’t blame anyone. That’s a lot of gift giving and celebrations to deal with at one time. I can’t say there wasn’t a little resentment as a child. 

My brother got it right. The third child in the Gilbert family came just 18 months after me and while Doug didn’t join the “Christmas Clan” he did enter the world on a significant day. July 4, 1957.

For his first few years he thought all those fireworks were for him!

As an adult I discovered that my somewhat famous great-grandfather, Fred Gilbert, also had a December birthday. December 18, 1865.

What a time that must have been, shortly after the Civil War. He grew up in Spirit Lake, Iowa and was an outdoorsman and remarkable marksman. So much so that when he was “discovered” and taken to his first professional trapshooting contest with many of the greatest shooters in the world present he bested the field and won the first place trophy.

He went on to have a successful career as a world champion trapshooter and bore the nicknames of “Dood” (a precursor perhaps of the term “dude”?) and “The Wizard of Spirit Lake”.

He married Maggie Elizabeth Klein and had two children. The daughter was Annie Oakley Gilbert, named after the famous Annie Oakley with whom Fred had formed a good friendship. And the son was named Thomas Marshall Gilbert. Thomas Marshall was another excellent professional trapshooter who took young Fred under his wing and mentored him. 

Thomas Marshall Gilbert was my grandfather and I wished I had bothered him to tell me more tales of his dad. There were lots of trophies from Fred’s career in Grandpa’s home and he did share some tales. I probably should have paid closer attention to them, but I do know that my great grandfather had quite a run, setting records of amazing feats and traveling with other famous trapshooters.

Maybe Grandpa didn’t want to brag too much. Or maybe Grandma gave him knowing looks not to make such a big deal of it. I enjoyed my grandparents and as a young adult my visits to their retirement home in Sun City, Arizona are etched into memory. I bear his name, as did my father, so I’m the third.

My own family is a joy and a blessing to me. My wife and I met when we were both working at a radio station in Albuquerque, New Mexico. We started as friends and it eventually bloomed into romance and we’re still together and approaching forty years in marriage. We have two wonderful children. Our daughter Kristen has two children of her own and is doing a remarkable job raising them through their teenage years. She works hard at her place of employment while also being a very loving mother. Annette and I are proud of her and joyful as grandparents to Jacob and Sophia.

Our son Eric was the second born of our two children and is a nurse who is dedicating his life to helping sick and injured people. He’s climbing the corporate ladder and has been on the frontlines of medical care, including during the Covid pandemic as an intensive care RN and now as a Unit Director for a Level One Trauma Emergency Department.

Oh, and while Kristen gets to celebrate a good birthdate in August, away from the clamor of holiday distractions, Eric has joined the Christmas time birthday parade as he was born on December 21, the Winter Solstice.

Maybe there is something in the water.

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