“Another Christmas,” he said out loud.
“Don’t you like Christmas?” the waitress asked.
“Christmas? Yes, I like Christmas,” the man said as he finished his last bite of hamburger he had been enjoying in the Marshall sale barn café.
The elderly woman who was filling his cup with hot coffee smiled and said, “I love the smells in the kitchen at Thanksgiving and Christmas. We always have extra big sales this time of year but seems the prices paid are lower. It should be the other way around for the poor folks around here. It’s a good time around here abouts, anyway.”
His old blue Chevrolet pickup had some of the presents his four children had ask for that his wife and he had agreed on. They were all waiting for him to get back across the river to their two-story house. His wife’s grandfather on her mother’s side of the family had built it many years back. It was a sturdy house with a fireplace in the main room. He had plenty of candy, nuts and fruit for the big bowl that was placed in the middle of the table on Christmas day. He smiled as he thought of how particular his children had been as they picked out their stockings. The biggest ones they could find were always the stockings they would hang there. The cedar tree they had gone out and found yesterday was a fine one and the children had loved helping their mother string the popcorn he had popped onto thread and draping it around on its branches. The pigs he had just sold brought in just enough money to keep his business going. Yes, he was a businessman, and his business was the most important one a man is ever blessed with having. His family was his business. Whatever it took to provide for them food, clothing and shelter, and at this time of year, a few extra special presents, he would do.
He thought back to when he had gone to war to fight against the Nazis of Germany. Yes, he was ready to fight against Imperil Japan because of Pearl Harbor, but the cruel beliefs of the Nazis was what had burdened his heart to the degree nothing else had in his life. He had his religious beliefs, but just because someone believed differently than he did was no reason to kill them. Just because they were better in business than he was, was no reason either. The only reason to kill was to protect people from people who were killing thousands of people, stealing all they had and moving on to new people and their countries, to concur, rob and kill. No one was safe in the world until all those who believed in such actions were dead. Hitler was dead now, but many had escaped execution and were hiding all over the world. Brazil was rumored to be one of the places where many had fled. Brazil was where he had been sent after leaving Florida and many other bases in the US where he had been trained. He had been trained in things his family and friends would never know of and he hoped it would always be that way. World War II had to be won, and it had been. Had it been totally cleaned up? No, people would have to fight against the evil teachings of the German Nazis forever, for people’s minds are easily corrupted.
He paid at the cash register, walked out to his truck and headed home.
He remembered Christmas back in the deep holler where his dad and mom lived. He had lived in the old house with them and his brothers. He had left the holler farm and gone to work in Siloam Springs at the tomato-caning factory. He had made friends there as he worked and stayed with relatives on his dad’s side that lived there. He could see the snow on the ground that Christmas in Arkansas and Oklahoma at the same time. Then, the war had been declared. He had heard stories about WWI from an uncle who still kept a picture of General John J. Pershing on his living room wall. The Germans had caused the world great pain in both world wars. The uncle would show pictures of the Dow Boys marching around the county seats square before they left for war and ones of them doing the same thing when they came back. The number was much smaller then, but the crowd that was watching was bigger. Christmas in KC was good but hard, for he had been too young to get into the army then. So, he worked in a machine gun and turret factory until he could enlist in Kansas because they let men join a year younger. Brazil, Brazil had been a place he loved to be in if he had to be away from Arkansas. He volunteered to be a belly gunner in a B-24 but he was an inch too tall. His official duty in the 8th Air force had been documented as an instructor specialist teaching about the machine guns on board the aircraft being flown out of Brazil, across the Atlantic Ocean to Africa, refueled, then on up to attack the Germans in the Sahara region and on up into Southern Europe, such as Italy and Germany its self. A stopover in Morocco had occurred on Christmas one year, but the other Christmas had been spent in Rio de Janeiro. Instructors did not normally go on missions in planes, but sometimes he had taken flights that were never recorded as official but were ordered.
He had made it back from the war but many had not. Sometimes he felt guilty about that, but being with his family made him believe there was some greater reason he could never comprehend.
His dad had built his mom a new house five years after the war ended and he had sisters now.
He and his wife and children would travel to their holler farm the day before Christmas and most of his brothers and sisters would be there. Back home that night, his children would sleep in their own cozy beds and rise up early Christmas morning to see what was under the tree for them. The noon Dinner would be eaten with his wife’s parents and her siblings. His kids loved playing with all their cousins on both sides. He had cows down in a canyon between his in-laws house and the river. His truck was able to make the trip down there and back again but the weather man out of Little Rock had been predicting snow sometime early Christmas day. His plow horse and home-made sled would be used to haul a few bales of hay and the block of sulfur salt down there, if that came to be.
The curvy road home was like an old friend. He enjoyed it. He gave a man a ride from the sale barn to the Cozahome turnoff then headed on along the road and off down the river hill. The ferryboat was on the north side of the river so he parked, walked down to the rivers edge and washed his face with the cool flowing water. A cold front was sure coming through the hills, he could feel it for sure.
The wind was coming up. “Could mean a White Christmas, just like Little Rock Bonner has been saying. If it does snow, I hope the system dissipates soon,” he thought.
When he got home, his wife was as excited as if it was already Christmas morning. She asked, “Did the hogs sell good?”
“Yes dear, they brought just enough so I could cover everything we had agreed to buy over there this Christmas. The banker said he could loan me enough to cover it but thanks to that one last bidder, I didn't need it. We still have money to go to Harrison and you and the kids can shop then. I’ll hide all the presents in the barn's corn crib now, so keep the kids occupied.”
She took the kids back in the house and insisted they warm by the fireplace so they would not catch a cold here right before Christmas.
He backed the truck back up to the barn and the presents were unloaded and hidden in the corn crib. He was especially pleased with the biggest one that she had no idea he had brought home just for her.
“Well, time to do the chores and eat supper. Tomorrow is Christmas Eve and time is going to be filled for two days.” He spoke the words as if talking to the truck.
He had seen many Christmases come and go but this one was going to be the best. He had finely been able to get his wife a Christmas present she had always wished out loud for but never expected to get. She hadn't known he had taken a load of pine post over to the sawmill and treatment plant the week before. This was already his best Christmas ever. This was one present he knew she was going to love. He was not good at picking out presents for the people he loved, but he tried.
The horses and cows were feed then the sheep and the hogs. The hogs were kept in pens made out of small log shelters he had crafted from materials he had gathered off his land. Only the nails and sheet metal had been purchased from the little hardware story near the sale barn. He had been educated in the old ways of doing things by his dad and the old-timers in the community and in the new ways by the military. It was all done to provide for his family and the self-satisfaction of doing all of it he possibly could by himself from what was available on his own land. His own land. That sounded good.
That night after supper his wife told a Christmas story she had heard when she was a little girl. He told a story about a Christmas he remembered when he and his brothers had caught a turkey by hand. They had chased a small flock until one of the birds had become entangled in a web wire fence. It had been a Christmas dinner they all remembered.
The children loved their mothers fairy tells and bear tells but they also loved their fathers stories of true life and adventures. Stories about how old uncle so-in-so did something or of aunt so-in-so and her reactions and opinions. Both sides of the family had been in this part of the land since back in the eighteen hundreds.
Christmas Eve came and the Ozark family was up early. His wife prepared breakfast while he fed the livestock and checked them over visually for any problems. The children were anxious to get an early start toward Harrison and the toy stores. There were two main toy stores on the square. Sterling’s and Crest variety. Western Auto and Oklahoma Tire and Supply had some great toys too, just not as many.
It was a long ride up to Harrison on the dirt roads but when they made it to US 62 and 412, pavement it was smooth riding and the smell of dust was left far behind. Before the day was over they had even looked through the clothing stores and all three shoe stores. Livestock feed stores were even looked through by his wife and kids as he checked out the prices of feed in Harrison as compared to Pyatt, Yellville, Marshall and Big Flat.
They had a very light dinner around noon because supper down in the holler would be a big spread. When all the shopping was done because the money allotted for that had been spent, they headed toward his parents home place. He took the back dirt road way through Valley Springs, Everton, Eros and Bruno. He observed everyone was asleep until they headed off down the ridge road to the turnoff down into the holler. They were all wide-awake and full of excitement to get to see Grandpa and Grandma as well as his brothers and sisters and all the cousins. There was four times the number of cousins in the holler as there was down at the river country gathering for his wife’s family.
The greetings were happy heartfelt ones, as everyone seemed genuinely thrilled just to be there with each other. Some of the men were standing around a fire in the front yard where a big cast-iron pot was boiling, full of beans and ham. That was one of their traditions because back in the early days that had been all they could afford. Kids were running around everywhere, in and out of the rocky cedar glades and in the big brown grassy yard next to a small spring where golden sand was made up one bank and the other was mud.
Once inside they found the house very warm even though that cold front had arrived with full force and snow was being forecast seriously now. The cedar Christmas tree was always decorated with snowball lights that one of his brothers had brought down from Kansas City a few years back. There were a few balls colored yellow, green, blue and red hung on it and a bell or two. The tree was pretty but the pile of presents was very impressive. It took up all of one corner of the main room. A game of monopoly was being played. The pieces that they moved on the board were made out of wood and were shaped on a lath in different ways then painted all the colors of the rainbow. When they had been young he and his brothers had got into arguments over the game. One night his dad had heard enough of the arguing and he got up, walked over to the table where they were playing, picked up the checker board with all the checkers on it, walked to the wood stove, opened the door and through it all into the fire. Neither he nor any of his brothers or sisters argued in front of him again, especially over a game. The old man knew how to fix that problem.
He found his dad and said hello, as did his wife and children. His mom was found in the kitchen where she and her daughters and daughters-in-law were working on preparing the meal. Most of it had been done and it was time for the dishes brought from the different homes represented there to just be warmed up a little. His wife had brought some pecan pie and home made peanut brittle. After all of his kids had said hello to their grandmother, they were excused to go outside and play with their cousins. His wife stayed in the kitchen to visit and help. He went back and talked with his dad and a brother about farming and the price of feed and equipment.
After the meal the presents were handed out. Because of the big number of gifts they all had to be small but the children seemed to enjoy everything immensely. The boys got play guns, balls and sometimes billfolds with a dollar to start them off right. The girls got dolls, books, jacks and such things.
None of his children were ever ready to leave the gatherings down in the holler but by the time the old Ford car had pulled out of the South side of the holler, they were all fast asleep.
Finally he and his wife had all of them tucked away in their own beds at home on the ridge farm. After he built up a big fire in the fireplace and every present from he and his wife had been placed under the tree they went to bed. Santa Claus would do his magic later on in the night.
The next morning the children were awake extra early and screaming to get up. He got up and chunked up the fire in the fireplace and put on a big piece of dry wood then a few pieces of green wood. He built up a hot fire in the home comfort wood and gas cook stove then put a pot of coffee on to peculate. He looked confidently at the small brightly wiped present hanging on a branch of the Christmas tree that said, “To My Dear Wife.”
He told his wife to decide when the house was warm enough for the children to get up and see what Santa had brought. The children yelled that they were warm enough. She said for them to just wait a few moments while she checked things out. She had on her warm long winter robe as she entered the room. “What a beautiful sight children. Santa did come last night .All of you must have been just good enough for Santa this year.” Then her eyes caught sight of the present in the tree. Slowly walking to the tree she began to read the tag. With a slightly trembling hand she opened it and started to scream, “It is beautiful!” over and over again. The children came running out and immediately started opening their presents. It was all beautiful to them also. They did not know what had really excited their mother so.
She made her way thought the flying paper and bows to him, hugged and kissed him then whispered in his ear, “You know you shouldn't have done this, but I'm glad you did! It is the prettiest watch I have ever seen!”
“Even prettier than the one someone gave you a few years ago?” He asked with a sly little green.
“Yes! O yes dear!” she responded enthusiastically.
As the children opened their presents and dug through their stockings he and she went to the front south facing window and found a foot of new Christmas snow had covered the ground and all the cedar and pine trees outside.
After about two hours, the children had calmed, the chores were done, breakfast was on the table and he and his wife were discussing how to bundle up everyone for the wooden sled ride out the ridge road to her parent’s house. It was then that the children heard that it had snowed during the night.
“Now kids, if you don’t eat your breakfast we cant get started out to Mom and Dad’s. Put your new toys up. You can play with them when we get back this evening.”
“Okay!” they all yelled while running to the window. A sled ride to grandpas and grandmas house on Christ day!” the youngest one said in an amazed voice.
The children reluctantly put their new prized possessions away in their rooms but the anticipation of a Christmas sled ride in a foot deep snow helped them along. They ate a delicious breakfast. They even had chocolate gravy.
He finished his meal first and went out to the barn to harness up his plow horse. Soon he called out for them to come on out and load up for a sled ride to their Christmas day dinner.
The snow crunched as they took off in the homemade sled. The salt block was in the right rear corner of the sleds bed. Three bails of hay were placed in the sled where the kids could ride on them while he and his wife road up front on the seat he had made for two. The trees were covered with the soft puffy white snow and the quietness was surprising. The horse’s hoofs made very little sound, as it seemed to pull the sled along the road up and down the small hills with ease.
The kids were working themselves into frenzy as he turned the horse down the road that was lined with the largest pine trees in the whole county. This was the lane, which led to the rock house their mother had grown up in. Along the straightaway they went, up a gentle rise and the house place came into view. The barn was near the foot of a dip in the lane where a tall sycamore stood with its seed balls hanging all over it. The house ahead was surrounded by hedge old oak trees. They came to a sliding stop and he held the horse steady while his family hurried out of the sled, up the front steps and into the warm familiar house where more presents and food and family greetings awaited them. He took the horse and sled back down to the barn lot, unhooked the sled, took the horse into the barn out of the snow, removed the harness from the horse, brushed him down a little, feed him a little pulverized corn and walked up to the house.
It smelt good in the house. His mother-in-law was a great cook and a good person. The sound of laughter filled the air as his kids played with their cousins. He heard comments from the other room where his wife was helping prepare the meal.
“Are the diamonds on each side of the watch real?”
‘Yes! They are certified and guaranteed to be real by the papers in the box and that jeweler up in Harrison,” his wife answered in a most definite voice.
Yes, this was another Christmas. One he would remember as the most rewarding one in his life because of the gift he had given his wife. Her smile and excitement had been the best gift he had ever received.
By A. L. Shipman Jr. 11-15-2012 © 2011 A.L. Shipman, Jr. All Rights Reserved. Watermark template. Powered by Blogger.
