Seasoned greetings in reused card.
Friends send it back and forth in joke-turned-family tradition
It was the year E.T. wanted to phone home. Edmontonians were clubbing at Scandals and Flashback, Ottawa was in the midst of a constitutional crisis and the up-and-coming Oilers won the Smythe division for the first time.
Mike Leggett sent a Christmas card to his boss in 1982 and started a Christmas tradition that persists to this day.
As a joke, he bought a card and addressed it to Michael, from “Mom and Dad.” Then he crossed that out and re-addressed it to his boss, Rodger Noble, at the Kingston Bank of Montreal in Ontario.
It was funny because the year before, Noble’s wife thanked him for a card and joked that Noble didn’t want to spend the money to send him one in return.
“It’s not that I’m cheap. It’s just he was too cheap to send me a card,” Leggett said.
He thought it was a oneoff laugh. But the next year, Noble added a small note and sent the card back. They’ve carried on that way every since, taking turns to add a note each year chronicling the birth, deaths, graduations, and nearly a half a dozen moves around the country, including a move to Edmonton in March 2011.
The card is now packed solid with handwriting and Noble added a folded sheet of paper that has also been filled up.
Noble is no longer Leggett’s boss. He’s now a good friend and the card has become a lasting link between their families. “It’s kind of cool that its gone on this long,” Leggett said, a day after mailing the letter to Ontario again. “It’s neat when you look back on it.” estolte@edmontonjournal.com twitter.com/estolte edmontonjournal.com Do you have a unique Christmas tradition? Tell us about it below or email Elise at estolte@ edmontonjournal.com.