William Penn Life, 2010 (45. évfolyam, 1-12. szám)
2010-12-01 / 12. szám
Tibor's Take with Tibor Check, Jr. Christmastime OUR FAMILY ENJOYS an extended and full calendar of Karácsony revelry. We kick off the holiday season the day after Turkey Day. Preparations for decorating our home usually begins a week before Thanksgiving (but this year we commenced with our annual ritual around Veteran's Day). The Check Family Christmas Season grudgingly ends after the celebration of Three Kings in January. Sometimes we have to take down the live fenyő before our Karácsony is over because the tree loses most if not all of its needles. This skeleton of a once green and fragrant evergreen has the potential to become an instant fire display with even the littlest spark. Our home has a very long and large cellar. Our underground sanctuary could easily be home to a six-or seven-lane bowling alley. You may ask: "What could a family do with such a vast expanse of formed concrete?" One word: STORAGE! In one section, we keep our extra pots and pans, my great-grandfather Cseh's hand-cranked sausage stuffer (which we still use for making hurka and kolbász) and shelves of vintage Tokaji wine. Another area of the basement contains our extensive library of Magyar records and tapes. We have so many records. There are actually some discs that have never been opened up from when they were sealed in plastic by the factory decades ago. We have a large lot of mint-condition, 75-year-old 78 RPM records that were given to my nagyapa and apa from the late George Gregosits. I estimate it would take more than two years of 24/7 playback to listen to all our records just once each. As you can imagine, we have a lot of music that has yet to be aired on our radio show, "The Souvenirs of Hungary." We have only been broadcasting for 31 years. Way back in the far left corner of the cellar is the permanent home for dozens of plastic storage containers filled with Christmas items. It takes my siblings and me well over an hour just to transport the containers upstairs. To expedite the transporting process, my dad hands us the boxes and we lug them up the steps to where my mom gives us final directions of where to put them. Some of the boxes go to the living room, others go to the top floor; some go to the kitchen, a few go to the garage for outside decorating and others go to the family room. (Someday, I will write a story about what else is stored in the basement is here 8 0 December 2010 0 William Penn Life
