High points from El Camino Real

by Chris Davis

Folks along El Camino Real have woken up and realized that we are less than two weeks away from Christmas. If you are one of the many people who have been putting it off, then you are running out of time.
It doesn’t take but one or two bad stormy days like we had on Saturday to get Christmas plumb out of sync. I learned a long time ago that there is not any use in getting all worked up about it, just do the best you can and move on.
There is a whole lot more to be happy about than there is to be upset. Nobody is going to notice that your tree is leaning a little bit or if your candy didn’t turn out quite as pretty as you’d liked. My six bits worth of news doesn’t always turn out like I planned it either, sometimes it leans a little one way or the other and it ain’t real pretty, but you’ll read it.
Josh and Jerrica Hudson celebrated a very special birthday this week. Their son Titus turned one year old. Turning one year old may not seem like a big deal for many folks but for them it is. Titus was born three and half months early and only weighed 1 lb. 14 oz. He was tiny and fought for life for four months in a neo natal intensive care unit in Houston.
It took lots of prayers and struggles to get this little fellow to one year. He is now a happy healthy crawling one year old baby boy. Titus is perfect and his parents are a testament to our faith. Happy Birthday Titus!
While I’m on the subject of babies, I guess I need to give you an update on how the recent Alto baby boom babies are doing. Thomas Mansell, the two week old son of Margo Kahla Mansell and her husband Tyler, is still in the hospital because he arrived early, but he is improving and growing everyday. Let’s all pray that he is home for Christmas.
Ben and Jordyn Johnson’s little girl, Zoey, is doing well when flash bulbs aren’t going off in her face. I think they have her picture made every other day. I’ve started going to the post office at night to avoid her grandmother Judy Johnson. I’m getting eye strain from looking at baby pictures on her phone.
Justin and Rachel Westbrook have their son, Beckett, growing like a weed. He is on Facebook so much it is like watching time lapse photography.
Lots of love is the best recipe for a happy, fat baby. All these new babies at Christmas time is truly a blessing to these families. I don’t have the heart to tell them that their babies aren’t the smartest, most beautiful, or sweetest ones there are. They can’t be because my grandson Sawyer is.
There is just something about babies and Christmas that makes everything right.
It was a little cold but otherwise it was a beautiful evening for the Alto Christmas Parade. People started lining up early for the big march all the way through downtown. It made me a little nostalgic when I thought back on all the great times my late neighbor Virgil Schochler and I rode in the parades. We always managed to come up with some crazy idea for the parade. One year I dressed him up like Mr. Scrooge and I was Tiny Tim. It was always fun. A big thanks to Larry and Kyle Griffith and the Alto Lions Club for putting on the parade again this year.
The Rusk Christmas Parade was as big as I have ever seen. There were people standing on top of people around the square when we came through. If it gets any bigger next year, they are going to have to start lining up in Alto.
All the rain and clouds that we were enveloped in over the weekend had lots of us feeling like Mister Scrooge. I think if I’d been locked up in the house with my wife doing Christmas decorations and hanging pictures for one more day, I would have lost it.
The rivers need a good flushing out every once in a while to get all the old dead logs and trash washed on down and clean things up. This year I think we’ve had several of these good gully washers, so the river bottom ought to be nice and clean by the time spring gets here. When this rain all gets past it won’t take us long to get cheered back up and into the Christmas Spirit.
The Alto First Baptist Church will be having their cantata on December 16 at 6:30. The Methodists had theirs last Sunday night and everyone said that it was really a good one. The Baptists will have an extra week to practice, so we’ll see what they can do with it.
I hope you’ll make an effort to come out and hear this special Christmas music.
This week we’ve got letters to Santa, and all sorts of different stuff in the newspaper, so I’ll cut this a little short so you can look at the rest of it.
I’ll see ya next week!

And remember, One day you will become a memory, for some people. Do your best to be a good one.