The True Christmas Story of Dyker Heights Lights

Mrs. Spata was stranded in a small town because of the snow…
Casa de Dyker Heights. Javier Brandoli

I don't know if New York did the miracle, but since I was there in December 2018 I like, much, christmas. Maybe it was the story Mrs. Spata told me about how she created the famous lights of Dyker Heights., not Brooklyn. I walked the streets with her arm in arm and she told me her story.

She told me that she was a beautiful young lawyer who was stranded by a very heavy snowfall with her car in the middle of a town in the United States where she had gone to see her parents., whom he had not visited since he went to university.

Dyker Heights Christmas Lights

He had bitter memories of his childhood and adolescence.. He remembered that before, when I was a teenager, She went to her graduation party with a stuffed gorilla because no one asked her to the dance.. “I had braces on my teeth and so much youthful acne that from a distance it looked like I had a mustache.”, he confessed to me. That day she swore that one day she would be a powerful woman who would not need any man to entertain her and would not return to that cow village where the haute cuisine was putting ketchup on roasted corn. When he said that, he squeezed my arm a lot..

He had braces on his teeth and so much youthful acne that from a distance it looked like he had a mustache

I don't know if it was because of that memory or because we passed by the house of a neighbor of Chinese origin., Mr. Chang, who had placed a train of lights that ran throughout the garden while “Jingle Bells” played. His eastern neighbor had been the winner of the neighborhood's most impressive Christmas decoration contest for the last four years.. She had won it the previous twenty. The tender lady Lucy Spata, the creator of Christmas for the entire planet, I understood that he had his weaknesses. «He wins because children in Cambodia make his toys for him. I think they eat sweet and sour pangolin at home, any day we will have a disaster, he confessed to me.

We continued walking and then he told me that in that snowfall he met a young man, carpenter and farmer, who had the body of a greek adonis under his plaid shirt. I noticed that his skin crawled when he remembered it.. He helped her open the hood of the car., from which suspicious smoke came out, and that she was trying to fix by smearing VapoRub on the steering wheel, because she, that had three races, He spoke six languages ​​and had two master's degrees, I thought everything was fixed by spreading VapoRub.

Dyker Heights Christmas Lights

He, meanwhile, He fixed the engine with a toothpick that he took out of his mouth and The next few days he taught the “city posh” how to open a jar of jam, to differentiate a pine from a marble column, things that those in the cities don't know, and the value of living in a town where the most exciting thing the rest of the year was the cart contest. “The winner receives a giant wooden pumpkin”, He proudly clarified him. And Lucy shut up and did not ask the question that went through her head when he heard him for not looking stupid. "What is a pumpkin?, thought, But I called me small before all his wisdom ".

He taught the following days to the "city cock" to open a jam boat, to differentiate a pine from a marble column

It, who was dedicated to working for an evil boss and retained a very close relationship with his parents, Although he did not even go to the funeral of his beloved grandmother because he caught him salivating the envelopes with which he announced the elderly evictions in the Bronx, He was gradually excited about the life of that village in which people greeted each other and desired Merry Christmas in the streets. A Lucy, The last time someone spoke in New York on the street was when returning at two in the office of the office, While waiting for a taxi, They took a razor and told him: “Stupid blonde, Give me your bag and don't make the list that we are all very bad in NY. We are from city, NO OF THE FIELD ". She shook. Everything was true. A new son Malos, Not as in the field.

Dyker Heights Christmas Lights

Perhaps it was to remember all that that decided at the last moment to reject an improvement of the contract that multiplied by two its already high birth. He called her the director of her company -a half -age lady who phoned her in a jacuzzi with creams put in her face while the manicure made a young man with a naked torso and she drank champagne to Sorbos-, and offered to be the deputy director, An attic at the Upper East Side and Air Jordan Shoes.

But Lucy had an epiphany of those that happen once in life. "That lady who had always admired was actually an unhappy one who did not know how wonderful a trunk full of resin is to grab and have to take off the sticky substance using a scourer and lizard soap.", Mrs. Spata told me while scolding a neighbor who had put up a figure of the Incredible Hulk with garlands. “This is Christmas, not the Comic On¡”, bawled, for a few meters later a little more relaxed tell me crestfallen: «The new generations do not respect anything». By saying it he kicked a reindeer hard who was wearing a New York Knicks scarf.

A middle-aged woman on the phone while she was in a jacuzzi with creams on her face while a bare-chested young man was giving her a manicure and she was sipping champagne

And then he sighed, he sighed loudly while complaining about his ankle, and returned to his story from ago 30 years. “I already put in the car and listening to a program that announced that it did not snow so much there from before the first pioneer with his pumpkins passed, I cried when I realized that the little town made sense of my life. I hated my job, and New York, and its museum offer, Cinemas and restaurants of all possible meals. I hated being able to go to parks, To the opera and the gym, of which I had already paid the subscription of the following year, 4000 dollars at the time with an offer in which they let me shower the days even without costs. I hated trips to Paris, Rome and Tokyo who did for work in which I was staying in five -star hotels ”, He told me while heading.

Dyker Heights Christmas Lights

He discovered that he wanted to live between the mountain he had in front and the river behind him. The mountain was then buried by the snow and the frozen river such as the ice bucket of a refrigerator. It was a beautiful environment, although something rough in the winter. In summer I knew that it would be different. "The first half of May, as of 1 the 8, It was the most beautiful site I saw. Pity that in June it was filled with some uncomfortable flies that are born among the cornfields and that they stick to the skin attracted to sweat when sometimes the 39 degrees in the shadow. And then, Sometimes the Julio's mosquito pests, that The river will overflow When otters shattered the natural dam, And the frog invasion Of the first rains that do not let you sleep at night… But hey, In September there were also two wonderful weeks just before the ice was buried again at the end of October and began to make the four at night ”, recalled.

I realized that I put pots to mention it. "Look, You see that teddy bear that they placed in the window of that house. Reminds me of when a grizzly macho appeared on ours and He killed and ate my two dogs in front of my two children small. The little boy is still going to psychotherapy to forget it ”, Mrs. Spata excitedly recalled pointing to another of Dyker Heights's houses.

Sight, You see that teddy bear that they placed in the window of that house. Reminds me of when a male grizzly showed up on ours and killed and ate my two dogs in front of my two small children.

The fact is that Mrs. Spata felt that Christmas that she should stay in that little town.. He confirmed it when he saw his small-town lover sweating while he finished cutting logs so that his parents could roast the thirteen-kilo turkey that they brought to the table where other friends and family sat.. Everyone was very happy to live in a village called, understood, something like White Falls Creek, o Creep, o Teeth…, I didn't understand well.

Dyker Heights Christmas Lights

They were happy that Christmas. I was too listening to it now. I moved to that moment and saw everything happen like a movie. I saw the camera slowly move away from the house where everyone embraced and sang Christmas carols. The image rose to heaven, He melted, And then I heard in that scene a shot. Was a shot heard?, Mrs. Spata, asked. “Yes. Mr. Robertson stuck a shot Before listening to his brother -in -law the story of the year that beat the cart contest when he placed in front of a teddy gorilla that was found in the garbage and full of bites ”, She told me.

And you, What was you from you? "I divorced my peasant (He called him peasant, He never mentioned his name) seven years after. The last thing I remember from him is that I had a bigger brewery than mine that was rammed again. I didn't see him work in his life after we got married.. I made the apricot jam that we sold. I ended up starting a company that today has 300 employees. I put my things in the car quickly one June, Thank goodness I didn't sell it to buy the tractor he wanted, and I fled with my two children and pregnant with the third. "I was terrified of spending another Christmas in that filthy hole and having to watch the September hayride again.".

And what happened next??, I asked him worriedly. «I returned to New York and decided to have a spectacular Christmas here so that no woman would be deceived by a townsman again in the spirit of the holidays.. Christmas comes every year and I put television and I watch movies that remind me that this drama continues to happen. Women must join for end with this abuse”, He answered me.

Dyker Heights Christmas Lights

The last thing I remember from him is that he had a bigger brewery than mine that was clutch again. I didn't see him work in his life after we got married.

I felt the New York Christmas spirit and thanked the venerable old woman who would have told me her tender story. We said goodbye with a hug after touring all that neighborhood of Dker Heights full of illuminated houses where Christmas germinated in the gardens. While I walked away I heard Mrs. Spata shout: “Mr. Chang, Let's see if I'm going to have to call immigration to put an end to all this nonsense of power cables hooked to the poles??”.

Merry Christmas!, I said. Happy Avity!, she answered with a mouth full of powders.

PD. The lady Lucy Spata is the true creator of the Christmas lights tradition of the NY neighborhood of Dyker Heights. She is not an old woman, you have 69 years. It seems that at Christmas 1986 She decorated her house like this in memory of her mother, Christmas decorations lover. The following year, Some neighbors imitated it and little by little the neighborhood ended up becoming an emblem of Christmas around the world.. It goes in honor of her, is it caricatured?? history.

Author: Antonio Cazorla Binotto

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