In December of 1974 our son and his wife, Carolyn, were expecting our first grandchild.  Son Lee was in the second year of his internship at the San Bernardino County Hospital.

Carolyn’s parents were used to new grandchildren.  They made it known that they were not going to California for the occasion.  My first wife, Ethel, decided that Carolyn needed extra support.  Consequently we drove to San Bernardino for Christmas.

The kids were vary gracious and gave us their bed.  It was a waterbed and made me an enthusiast for a waterbed.

We had a great Christmas.  A few days later, the evening of the 28th of December, Carolyn walked over to the hospital.  The next morning of December 29th 1974, our first grandson, Cameron Todd Hein was born.

Ethel helped Carolyn for a number of days until right after New Year’s Day.  We were still in business, so it was necessary that we get back to Seattle and to work.

As we arrived back in Seattle, I don’t have any idea how we happened to be driving north on Third Avenue.  That is one avenue that I very seldom drove on.  Anyway, when we arrived at Third and Union Street, we were across from a men’s clothing store.  The windows had big signs saying that they were in the middle of a big sale.

I had taken travelers’ checks on the trip that we had used very little of.  We, therefore, had cash to spend.  We parked and went in to see what we might want.  That being 1974, one was still able to find parking near any place one wanted to go.

Among the items I bought were a sport coat that I can’t remember and a pair of chartreuse slacks that I wore for golfing.  The piece-de-résistance was a pair of Haggar wool plaid trousers.  I remember very well the price was $4.95.

For many years Dewar’s Scotch Whiskey showed a man in very similar plaid pants in their ads in magazines.  I had Fay look at the plaids, and she found forest green, red, yellow, white, greenish-black plus several other shades of green.

Naturally, with the preponderance of reds and greens, it made them my Christmas pants.  Every year since 1975 I have worn those pants for Christmas and Christmas Eve.  That is, I wore them every year until Christmas 2005.

My nephew, Dave Benson, and his wife, Saran, have a clam chowder and salad dinner on Christmas Eve.  This is a traditional meal that they have conducted for years.  Fay and I had been invited and were pleased to attend.

Of course, I wore my Christmas pants to the occasion.  The next morning we were having Christmas dinner at our house.  We were having Fay’s daughters and their children.  I also had my sons Lee and Richard and his wife, Diana.  We also had daughter Laurie’s mother-in-law.

That morning I was getting dressed and attempted to get on my Christmas pants.  Try as hard as I could, I couldn’t get the trousers to close.  I have no idea why the pants that I wore the night before would not fit on Christmas morning.

For the first time in thirty years I didn’t wear my plaid pants for the holiday.

Right after Christmas, I took the trousers in to a seamstress to have the waist let out.  They were able to enlarge it almost two inches.  So I’m looking forward to wearing those plaid pants for many more Christmases.