"The Unbearable Truth... Fear Eats The Soul": November 2025

Saturday, November 29, 2025

As shoppers flooded their local Walmart yesterday, I was remembering all of the holiday seasons of my life that began with a trip to Kmart after Thanksgiving. Kmart was the first retailer to claim the title from Sears of the world's largest retailer. What many who even remember this retail juggernaut may not know about the now long gone Kmart is that it was founded by the Detroit based S.S. Kresge Company, a five and dime that was an early competitor to the also long gone F.W. Woolworth Company.

For me, there's not much holiday shopping to be done anymore. My children are all grown and gone, even grandchildren are grown. My parents and half of my siblings have passed through the veil already, and now I'm left with mostly memories of holidays past; many were joyous and even more were incredibly painful, lonely and depressing. At this point in my life, I try to focus on the better memories that persist in my mind's eye. And among these were the many holiday shopping trips to Kmart, Sears, and J.L. Hudson's (corporate predecessor of Target).

This lovely video takes me right back to 1974 and a holiday trip to Kmart Store No. 1 in Garden City, Michigan with my mother. Of all the shopping choices we had back in those days, Kmart was always my favorite. Their stores were bright and open back then and the selection while not always the best you could buy was nevertheless always good value for the money. It had to be, because back then they made the same promise as Sears, "Satisfaction Guaranteed."

When I think about how much things have changed over the years, I marvel at the fact that there will grown folks reading this who don't even know about Sears, Kmart and the many other stores that were the places that brought Christmas dreams to life for generations. At this stage in my life, material things are not so important anymore; there are very few things I want that I don't have.

Now my Christmas dreams are found in pleasant memories of days gone by; of the seasons in the past when life was simpler, easier and occasionally quite sweet. I'll spend most of this holiday season remembering the smiles on the faces of my sons when "Santa" made all their dreams come true, and of one special Christmas when the beloved one brought me that same joy.

"I am always remembering..."