GaryOsberg.com

Good morning from Collegeville,

Nine days until Christmas. I have all of my shopping done and now I simply have to pace myself on the cookies and candy.

Children love Christmas, as well they should. As with most families, some years Christmas gifts were easy to come by and some years they were hard to come by. The Christmas of 1956 was a memorable one for me. My mother had to take an apartment in Little Falls, having left Dad after years of his not being very responsible. That Christmas, Santa brought us six big Tonka Toy 18 wheel trucks. There was a cattle truck, an oil tanker, a freight truck and three more. This was a perfect gift for a family with five boys. For years I had the impression that they were from a social agency that served the poor. It turned out that the gift giver was Dewey Johnson, a classmate of my mother, who was acquainted with one of the founders of Tonka Toys. Dewey had already passed on before I learned this from my mother, so I did not get a chance to thank him.

Perhaps you know of a family that has come upon hard times and they could use a Secret Santa.

Here at St. John’s we are blessed with a lot of signs of the season. One is the huge tree in the Great Hall. If you have ever wondered how they get the tree inside, simply go to www.youtube,com and type in “Great Hall Tree” or perhaps this link will work http://bit.ly/7H3YDf

A couple of weeks ago Almanac ended the show with this video. It is a wonderful example of the power of music. Enjoy. http://www.carlsonschool.umn.edu/holiday11/

The show this week is a live broadcast from the Town Hall on West 43rd Street in New York City. Special guests include singer-songwriter Gillian Welch, Itzhak Perlman and the Klezmer Conservatory Band, Joel Grey and Rob Fisher plus The DiGiallonardo Sisters. Enjoy the show.

“Needs that everybody can answer: maybe a word of forgiveness and understanding to be said, a surprising word of hope when nothing was expected, a gesture of crazy generosity to be made, a new courage to take an unpopular stand.” Anonymous

PS. If you are interested in branding your organization on MPR, let me know.

If you like hunting and fishing check out www.theoutdoorreport.com