In my lifetime I've probably received hundreds of Christmas gifts, but there are a few I remember best. I never lobbied for an Official Red Ryder Carbine-Action Two-Hundred-Shot Range Model Air Rifle so what I got on Christmas morning was always a surprise. On one particular Christmas in the early to mid-eighties I received a little blue transistor radio.
It was freedom. The radio would go everywhere I went. I used to sleep with it. In the summers, I listened to 1430 CJCL which was carrying Blue Jays games called by Tom Cheek and Jerry Howarth. Other nights I would crawl the dial just to see what I would pick up. I'd start at one end and slowly make my way to the other side, stopping for a bit whenever I pulled in a station. I guess it was sort of a low tech scan. I'd do this for FM and then switch to AM. I loved that damn radio.
It's a love affair that has continued to this day. The primary reason I have an iRiver instead of an iPod is because the iRiver has a radio built in. I want my MP3, but I'm not ready to give up my radio entirely. In this day of MP3 players and satellite radio there's little room in a kid's life for a transistor radio. I'm just glad there was room in my life for one that Christmas morning.
