My Favourite Christmas Present - Luke Martin-Jones!

I have always loved Christmas, ever since I was a young child. As the dark nights became darker, the bright festive lights would flicker into action and like every other family we would prepare for the big day. I would spend the weeks before Christmas, browsing through Mum’s mail order catalogue, looking for inspiration, trying to decide what to ask for. Of course as a child of the 1970s, I had a vast array of toys to choose from – Action Men, Twister, Spirograph and Lego, to name just a few. As a child I was never greedy or demanding and was always grateful for what I received; I understood my parents weren’t wealthy but never went without and have some fond memories growing up in a time before computers.

My favourite Christmas present wasn’t chosen by me or given by my parents, it was a gift from my Grandparents, something I could never have imagined owning myself and a deeply poignant part of my Childhood.

It must have been 1978 or 1979 when my Grandad Eric and Nanny Violet presented my brother and I with a new Ferguson black and white television set, an amazing present at the time. Technology in the 70s was pretty expensive compared to today, so this was a top of the range gift that a child like me could only dream of. Switching over the three TV channels at will, without being told off was a luxury that gave me a sense of independence I didn’t have before.

My Father was never a fan of the newer channel ITV, so consequently we never really watched it, except when Mum watched Coronation Street. With a brand new Portable sat on my chest of drawers in my bedroom, I could finally see all the programmes I had wanted to watch, but was never allowed. I remember vividly, sneakily watching a show called ‘Tales of the Unexpected.’ This was a bizarre programme, showcasing small one off drama’s that were on occasion quite raunchy for a young eight year old boy, but it was a big part of my growing up process and a show that remains very firmly in my memories from that wonderful age of discovery from innocence!

Televisions are common place now, every household having one in every room, but when I was small they were a ‘big deal;’ having more than one, meant you had made it and I almost felt like the ‘posh lot’ on the expensive side of the street. For once I had something to boast about to my friends; this was my gateway to another World and a future we all now take for granted.

Christmas is a time for making memories and although I no longer have the TV, I still have the recollections from that time. Today that Television would be classed as retro, almost an antique, worthless, harking back to a decade most want to forget. Then it was a life changing present that inspired and educated me, gave me hope for the future and a dream of travelling the World, something I do for real today! A present like no other and a link to a life growing up at a time of change!

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