My card for this year is a still life of my mother's pressed and etched glass pieces. I do not know how old they are, but they must be over seventy years old. My mother would be 112 this year. The vase was a gift from her sister Emilia who gave a similar vase to another sister, Jozefa. The ceramic tree was purchased at a store on Presa Street in downtown San Antonio on a hot summer day for $10 over 30 years ago. There is a music box in the base which plays "O Tannenbaum."
This is my thirtieth photo-Christmas card. I started in 1976 and skipped two years after I returned from Saint Louis.
Dear Gloria,
I hope all of your family are well and enjoying the Holiday Season. I am fine. I have been on 3 train trips this year. In February I went to St. Louis to visit friends and former co-workers. I had not been back since I left in 1995. In March I went to Las Vegas to help a friend who had broken his shoulder. Although he was in pain a lot, we did quite a bit of sightseeing. Although Las Vegas is not the kind of place I would ordinarily go, I really enjoyed the chance to see it. Last month I went to Del Rio, Alpine and Marfa, TX. (I passed through New Braunfels on the train on these last two trips.) I enjoyed the 1886-7 courthouses in those towns, as well as the oldest winery in Texas in Del Rio. I really enjoyed Alpine and Marfa in the Jefferson Davis Mountains. They are both very urbane, friendly, and sophisticated. Both have beautiful near-100-year-old hotels where I stayed. El Paisano in Marfa is where Elizabeth Taylor, Rock Hudson, and James Dean stayed during the filming of Giant. I stayed in Dean's room. He is still an icon there.
I am planning on putting my condo up for sale in February. I am hoping to move to the Wellington Retirement Community in San Marcos, Texas, and be your neighbor. It is a beautiful facility for independent living with buildings with 4 apartments scattered around a large campus. I have been downsizing and am ready. I am excited about living there, but I dread what I have to go through to get there.
Jack Posey is in Fort Worth. He may move to a retirement place there in February. He and I are planning a train trip to Chicago in the spring. I want to take other train trips next year, but I don't think it is wise considering my move.
I wish all of you a wonderful Christmas and New Year.
Joe Scroggins
Dallas, TX
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