The holidays often provide a festive and highly spirited backdrop for connecting with family and friends and creating fond memories. For many folks, this time of year also sparks strong recollections of past celebrations—which can be marked by a mix of sadness, loss, hope and just plain ole happiness. From a house fire to terminal illness, bright beginnings and a tradition adopted from Romanian friends, below, GPC faculty and staffers allow us to reminisce with them.

Marissa McNamara, English, Online/Clarkston

“My husband, Mike, loved Christmas so much so that he began his shopping in August. He would hide things around the house and take great delight in teasing me and asking me to make guesses. The fact that he had cancer did not stop him from beginning his shopping in the fall of 2004. He sat at the computer and bid on eBay items while he was off work and I was teaching. Mike died on Dec. 2, 2004. A week before, he told me where I could find those presents. I found them, wrapped, exactly where he said they would be.”

Desean Thompson, Plant Operations 

“The most memorable holiday for me was about three years ago when my mother, younger brother, older sister and I moved into a house for the first time. We had lived in apartments and with my grandmother before then. We didn’t decorate; we were just glad to be in the house because it was ours.”

Debra Denzer, English, Clarkston

“In 1984-85, my husband Bob King (Political Science, Clarkston) our one-year-old son, Ryan, and I were in Timisoara, Romania, where a lovely local family of Hungarian and German heritage welcomed us into their home regularly. On Dec. 6, 1984, we were present during their tradition of St. Nicholas Day, when they left small gifts in the shoes of their two young sons and a letter to each written by St. Nicholas (their parents, of course).

I so loved this activity that we have continued it in our household. On Dec. 6, a little gift in the shoes of the children and on Christmas Eve, a letter from Santa Claus in the stockings of my children. 

In the beginning, the letters were really for them from Santa, acknowledging their accomplishments and good works of the previous year and encouraging continued growth in the year to come. I would disguise my writing and write on different kinds of paper each year. I have done this since 1985 and saved the letters. Now, they have become a treasure to me to read and to remember their childhoods each year.

When our granddaughter was born, I gave Ryan and his wife, Amanda, all of his letters, and the two of them have started the same tradition in their little family. (I still write one for our daughter, Alison, who is a college student, and she looks for it in her stocking every year!)

Traditions matter.  They can come from anywhere as long as they come from the heart.”

Larry Searcy, Plant Operations       

“One of my most memorable holidays stems back to 1985, when I got my first brand new car, and it had only 30 miles on it from where they picked it up and drove it to me in Decatur. It was a BMW 325. I kept it for two years and traded it in for another.”

Michael Hall, English, Clarkston

“In the late eighties, I was working in the writing lab at Dunwoody part-time but worked full-time at Brandon Hall School, a private school in Dunwoody. Mrs. Sauls, the head of the English Department at Brandon Hall, organized a way for us to collect and wrap Christmas gifts for children in need every year, and I really enjoyed helping.

When I was hired full-time at GPC, then DeKalb College, Mrs. Sauls gave me all her contact information, and I continued her tradition since she was retiring. For me, it is the highlight of the holidays, not just for what it does for the kids but also for what it does for the camaraderie and moral of the faculty, staff and students who participate.

As chief elf of the gift-wrapping party, I run a tight organization: you will wear an elf hat; you will cross off each gift from each child’s list as you wrap it.”

Officer L. Reed, Public Safety, Decatur

“The most memorable Christmas was when all of us (eight siblings) made it home at the same time. That was back in 1983.”

Suzie Amsberry, Marketing & Communications

“My family is quirky. We have always had odd things happen during the holidays. One particular Christmas season went awry. On Dec. 10 of that year, when I happened to be 10 years old, our house caught on fire.

I was sitting on the sofa watching a Christmas movie and folding clothes (strange that I remember that). My sister was upstairs and my two brothers were in their bedrooms downstairs. There were four kids ranging in ages from 3 to 12. My parents were at a Christmas party so we had a babysitter who was all of 15 herself. All of a sudden we smelled smoke followed by a loud bang! Our dryer had exploded in the next room, the culprit being liquid fabric softener.

There were flames and very scared children. We got out of the house before the entire downstairs caught fire. We lost two bedrooms, a bathroom and family room to fire and water damage, but the Christmas tree, surprisingly, was intact. Some of the presents were smoke or water damaged and some of the ornaments melted from the heat. 

We lost only material things, but what we gained was priceless. We had the most wonderful neighbors. They would not hear of us staying in a hotel or renting a house. They wanted us there in the neighborhood with them for Christmas. We lived with them for about two months. Just picture an extra family of six living in neighbors’ homes.

When we were finally able to return home, it was well after the holidays. Our neighbors got together and celebrated Christmas with us in our rebuilt home. I’ll never forget it.” 

Michelle Bryant Johnson, Social Sciences, Newton

“A fond memory I have of Christmas is when my siblings and I had all grown up and, although living in different parts of the country, we made it our business to all be home by Christmas Eve together—having fun and reverting to childhood silliness.

When I got married, I cried our first Christmas because I missed being at home with my siblings that Christmas Eve. Today, my siblings and I gather for sure at Thanksgiving, with a few of us gathering for Christmas Eve. The silliness continues.”

Carol P. Lynn, Marketing and Communications

One of my favorite Christmastime memories is of the year I was home sick with the flu from my job at the Macon Telegraph newspaper. I had written a column for the Sunday paper about being a “Christmas baby”—a silly, whining piece about how those of us who are born around Christmas get cheated. In it, I asked readers to tell me their own tales of being or having Christmas babies.

This was in the olden days before email and social media, so when I began receiving replies, they came in the form of stamped and mailed letters—stacks and stacks of them that my co-workers brought by my apartment. It was such fun to read them; some even sent me birthday cards!

Everyone who responded got a certificate from the newspaper. It said something like “when you wish me Merry Christmas, also tell me Happy Birthday because I’m a Christmas baby!”

I wrote a follow-up column detailing readers’ responses—celebrate your half birthday in June, no Santa on the birthday cake and one of my favorites: get Planned Parenthood to champion the cause of planning not to have a Christmas baby. 

That last bit of advice didn’t work so well for me, I’m afraid—eight years later, I gave birth to my own “Christmas baby” on Dec. 21 and brought her home on my birthday, Dec. 23. And that’s my real favorite holiday memory!