I thought I’d post some of my favorite Christmas and New Years Entries from several different diaries in my collection. Ever since I started reading vintage diaries 36 years ago, each time I would read a passage that really inspired me or touched my heart, I saved it in my “Favorite Quotes” file. As you can imagine that file is quite large. I pulled out several Christmas and New Years quotes from different people and different eras to share with you here. I hope they bless you as much as they have blessed me. And after the holidays I will continue on with full diary posts, including John’s Grief Diary. May God bless you and your family in the coming New Year.

One of the favorite diaries in my collection is written by a young woman by the name of Susan Huntington Odiorne. She is just 17 years old when she begins her diary in 1858. She has already lost her mother 7 years earlier in 1851 and in March of 1858, Susan’s sister Amelia gave birth to a child and both the mother and child died during the birth. All throughout the diary Susan talks about being in “The Old Mansion” which is the family home in Framingham Massachusetts. She is the most beautiful writer and her diary carries you through 5 years of her life to New Years Eve of 1863. Susan is now a mother, having given birth to a baby girl in the spring of 1862. She named her child Flora. Here are three of my favorite Christmas and New Years passages written by Susan herself….

“December 17^th,1862.

One year ago today I sat in this room, by this stove, with this dress on writing in this book on this table. I repeat the words I wrote then, “I sit here in my chamber alone. I am comfortable and comparatively happy. All around me is pleasant and as I sit here writing, I am listening to the wood cracking in the stove, and on this cold day it makes all within seem warm and cozy.” Have I moved since then? Have I sat and drank and slept and laughed and cried since then or have I still been sitting here as in a dream. I well remember all those Christmas days of my childhood, when after lying awake all night with visions of dolls and candy dancing ore my head, I would awake to find the largest stocking in the house filled to the brim with everything my little brain could think of or my very heart desired. What a long long day it seemed and then when evening came ma would draw out the trundle bed from under hers, draw it way out, till the head of it almost touched the wide open grate filled with bright blazing coals and then she’d dress me in my little flannel night gown and George too and pa would take one and ma the other and they would pat our little feet, bare and white. (I remember four of them) out toward the night coals till they were heated through, then they would put us in the little trundle bed and we would lay and look over the head of the bed and watch our parents and our elder mother and sister. Oh, happy innocent, ignorant childhood. To the fullness of my heart I enjoyed thy long blessed hours, yet if I could, I would not ask thee to return. I would not change from the very age I am. Therefore farewell Oh hasten time, hasten on quickly for six months and then stop and stay forever. This year is slowly dying away. Oh let me daily watch its progress and be my very happiest for next Dec. where will be “Little Susie Odiorne.”

“December 31^st, 1862.

Every new year’s eve I have looked forward and thought that the next year I should be writing in this same book, the past of the then future, but now I close the book forever.”

“12 o’clock. The year has gone! Now it is 1863. Farewell to the past. Time will pass on, and leave its impressions upon me. My brow will darken and there will be threads of silver in my brown hair but oh may my heart be as young as now for Flora will look to me for love and sympathy. Oh God make me capable to bring her up. She will always come to mother when tired and troubled and lay her little weary head upon my bosom and pour out her sad story into my ear and then leave it all with mama even as I would now. Oh my mother let me lay my head upon thy bosom that I have been parted from so long and receive strength from thy blessing to push forward. Mother! let me lay my weary head upon thy bosom for a moment even as I used to in childhood.”

“Backward turn, backward oh time in your flight. Make me a child again; just for tonight.

Mother come back from your echo-less shore, take me again to your heart, please once more,

Kiss from my forehead the furrows of care. Press thy dear gentle hand over my hair.

Over my slumbers your loving watch keep, rock me to sleep mother, rock me to sleep.

Mother, dear mother the years have been long, since last I was hushed by your lullaby song.

Many a summer the grass has grown green, blossomed and faded our faces between.

Yet with strong yearnings and passionate pain, long I tonight for thy presence again.

Come from the silence so long and so deep, rock me to sleep mother, rock me to sleep.”

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The following was taken from unnamed woman’s 1873 diary. She was 50 years old.

“January 1st, 1873
Arthur gave me this diary. I now commence at the opening of this New Year with another diary. With the uncertainty of ever covering even one page after this one with my thoughts or deeds of mine, nevertheless I begin, “seeing not a step before me as I tread the days of the year. The past is still in Gods keeping, the future his mercy shall clear. What looks dark in the distance may brighten as I draw near.” Olivia and Nelly Foote and two gentlemen came this P.M. and left on this evenings train. A. and Lannie are both out.”

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This next passage was written by a young woman whose family owned and operated a Gold Leaf Company in Hartford Connecticut. The factory is shown above and the family house (now in disrepair) was located on the same property as the gold leaf plant. Her name is Lucy Mabel Swift.

“December 25th, 1900.
Wishing you a Merry Christmas. The weather is mild but dull and cloudy. This evening however the moon has come out beautifully and clear. It’s full tonight. This Christmas has been a particularly happy one, though it has been a very simple one. Matt and Grace were the only extra ones to dinner which consisted of roast beef, turnips, potatoes, plumb pudding and sauce and grapes. It looks very simple written but come to eat it was a great deal. The men folks have spent most of the day in the shop. We girls swept bed rooms this morning and rested this afternoon. The presents were opened of course immediately after breakfast. Every one was pleased with them. I heard Ida say, “Now I am happy.” That is the way everyone should feel on Christmas day and I am sure most of us to feel so at least for part of the day. What a blessed thing it is to have Christmas a day on which we can forget that the world is hard and that life is a struggle and remember only that now at least we are happy.”

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Short but oh so beautiful. The next entry is written by Dr. Leroy E. Parkins on New Years Eve in his 1913 diary.

“December 31st, 1913

And another year slips silently into that realm whence nothing returns, the past.
Soon a New Year will be born and create for us all the wondrous things of life. There is a certain charm and mystery to the world in seeing an old year go and the New Year come. We have a feeling that something unusual is taking place yet we cannot just explain…..”

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“December 31st, 1927.

To Me: 1927 is nearly gone, gone! To think that this glorious year has nearly ended. What wondrous joys has it not brought? So few sorrows or ills. Have I done anything worth while? That is the important question. My trip was a glorious adventure. It was wonderful. I had often dreamed delightful dreams of travel, but those dreams were always of trips abroad to the mysterious and romantic lands of Europe and Africa and Asia. Often indeed have I dreamed of a visit to the Sahara, to the garden of Allah, there to meet with God, to walk and talk with Him, to ride the stately camels over those endless sand dunes, to venture through those queer desert towns, to hear the sound of wild, wild fierce music that reaches way down deep and makes one ache with feeling. Oh, that those dreams may come true. Often too have I dreamed of journeys to the palaces of India, to the temples of Greece and the castles of Europe. But a great surprise and quaint adventures was my journey this summer. Oh! The mountains of the Sierras, those magnificent stately peaks with pines and pines and pines. As it is, I think that this year I have begun to think more profoundly and have come to enjoy reading the more thoughtful and great books; tragedies seem more pleasing to me than happy books, they seem so much more real to me. Lately I have become very restless and have an uncontrollable desire to live, really live. I do not call this existence, this school, study, practice, sleep existence, real life! The longing comes over me most strongly at night when the mournful whistle of the train, I hear and when I look up at my star and ask him what my life shall be. Then I feel that I am of no use that I am not fulfilling my mission. Here I sit this New Year’s Eve and ponder and wonder. Will I be able to stand despair, hunger, and poverty should that be my lot or if I should become rich would I forget that there are those who are hungry and alone? Why write all this? God knows what is in my heart. He knows and understands. May I live as courageously and bravely as did the Geste brothers. May I love as strongly as did they. May I be brave and true and when I leave my some dear person weep ever so softly! May mine be a “beautiful gesture” in life! Only God and I know what is in my heart. Marthe Johnson.“

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“January 1945.

Another night, the air alert caught us at a dance. My escort had two helmets, fortunately. We sat on his veranda to watch the blacked-out scene below. I took off the white slippers and put on a pair of his big field boots in case we’d have to dive for a cave. We didn’t, I’m glad to say, for it would have been full of bones. But the excitement went on for a long time, for hours. We sat and sat, “sweating out” the time while people back at the place of the dance were rolling up in blankets on the floor, to get some sleep under their helmets since they could not return to their posts. You simply don’t move under such circumstances, no matter how long you must wait. The nurses and I got home late, but not too late. You can probably understand why, to us now, the lovely moon no longer means beauty and peace. Brilliantly lighted land and ocean, it is a matter for apprehension. Going through the dimly lighted tents, I couldn’t lose the remembrance that people at home were wondering about each man, that at home each one had his own place, perhaps a room to himself and certainly a desk and dresser rather than a tiny pile of belongings on the coral dust beneath his narrow hospital bed…..”