Living in Christmas Town
These precious years are slowly losing their petals.
This morning I skated our car into town at 6:30 AM to put my son on his bus to school. We drive on solid ice at least 2 weeks out of the year, sometimes more. The town was almost empty, just a few cars on the road, driving cautiously. The silence is glorious and pure. This morning was just a taste of what's likely to come in the next few months.
Back in the 70's the citizens of our little oasis voted on a new path for the town. One of the most transformative choices was to preserve and develop the vestiges of our Western look and feel, ensuring its seductive Americana charm. I'm not going to name it here because its already appeared on a few "best of" lists and we've got enough people living here! They required that developers build for quaintness, ensnaring drivers as they travel East, descending from the Cascades onto the high desert brush, pine and cedar mesas.
The results are likely better than they could have anticipated: every winter, when the snow moves down from the ridge, our postcard town transforms itself into a Hallmark Holiday movie set.
My son doesn't seem to notice. He's lived here long enough to take the sweet, safe serenity for granted. He likes living here, he doesn't need to move to a big city, but he doesn't sit in wonder as I often do. I make sure to point out the raging beauty around us whenever I can. "Its going to be an incredible sunrise this morning, see those colors starting to break through the clouds?" He dutifully grunts, glancing up from his phone. I believe that my prosthelytizing is sinking in somehow.
A few houses down from the bus stop is one of the best living potters I've ever seen. His exotic use of color, his merging of Japanese themes with hints of wild Cascadia, seem to go unnoticed here. Of course we'd have a great potter a block down from the cute little library, thats just the way things are in Christmas Town. If you catch the potter on a good day he'll talk to you about kayaking or fishing the local rivers. On a bad day he'll eye you with the suspicious disdain reserved for those passing through from California. I make it a point to buy my Christmas gifts there when my budget isn't too tight. His prices are great of course (as they would be in Christmas Town) but I've got a lot of coffee cups to buy.
They do a great job on the lights each year; not gaudy - just right. When the town gets buried in snow, as happens most years, the resulting muffled glow feels like distilled magic frozen in time. Some shops transform into Holiday paradises, festooning with red ribbons and stuffed Santa's wherever they can. For the Holiday addicted, this town is a place from which few return. You can spend a lifetime wandering through shops, stopping for coffee beside a fire, crack ice at the frozen bank of a stream that rushes through a park the edge of town, or stare in unabashed amazement at the fifty head of horses that graze just south of the barn someone turned into a 3 screen movie theater.
Most of the people who work at our tiny market know me. I'm pretty sure they all have figured out I'm a widower raising two kids on his own. They don't say anything outright, but are especially kind to me when we talk about kids. "You're a good Dad" I've heard on more than one occasion. There's a bigger grocery store on the other side of town, but the produce isn't as fresh and the people aren't as sweet.
If this were a real Hallmark Christmas movie I'd already be well into a romance with an attractive shop keeper (ideally played by Jewel). She would have grown up in this town but moved away to pursue a career in art, returning only after she'd lost her husband to raise her two children someplace familiar. We'd meet at the market, bumping into each other, accidently swapping grocery bags as we picked up the mess we'd made. At least thats what my daughter would want to happen. She plans this kind of romantic meetup every day.
"You've got to lose weight Papa" she insists as she pats my belly. "You need a six pack if someone is going to date you!" I'm about 5 cans shy of a six pack.
I've been making these early morning drives to get him to his bus stop for over four years now. Now that he's got his learners permit he drives in most mornings. After so many years I'm ecstatic to be a passenger. I have more time to moon at the countryside as it flies by. This mornings thin layer of snow made it impossible to see the road clearly. It seemed too much to ask a new driver to make up a lane and charge ahead. I gave him a break, just this once. He's got to learn those winter driving skills, and there's only one way to do that. I've grown to love the feeling of studded tires scraping over ice as I take turns at thirty-five mph that our old truck could barely handle at fifteen. A good snow car brings out the kid in me.
We've made this trip in all kinds of weather, in darkness and light. This time of year is my favorite. The snow eats sound, you can sense it die as the echos of traction tires chewing up winter wander out across the fields. Deer still roam the streets, uncovering the last tufts of Falls harvest before heading into sheltered valleys in the foothills. It's been as cold as -6° with snow drifts over 8 feet. In those early years I'd carry Truly from her bed and lay her down with a blanket in the back seat of our old truck. After dropping Tadg off we'd drive a few blocks to Angelines for bagels. We'd drink hot tea and color together, talking about what the day might hold for us. After Covid, Angeline stopped opening so early, and Truly's schedule changed with a new school.
These precious years are slowly losing their petals.
After he gets on the bus I'll stop by the Sinclair gas station to fill up. There are still attendants here who pump gas for you. Most of the time they're older men, who've already lived a lifetime of winters. Their hands are swollen with work and time. This is a winter gig for my attendant, he leads fishing trips and does odd jobs throughout the summer. We exchange a few words about the cold and the quality of other drivers (which is always horrible), then I putter across the street to the bakery to grab a muffin for Truly. She's sleeping at home now, our German Shepherd laying across half her body, waiting for me to come through the front door for a few minutes of pets and snuggling before we get on the road for our next commute.
I'm careful driving home. It's in these alone moments that I think about what would happen to the kids if I had an accident. Who would come get me? Would I walk the rest of the way home? We know a lot of good people here, many who would pitch in. Still, we don't have a lot of room for errors. I feel my shoulders relax when I pull into the driveway, seeing Dandelions pointed ears silhouetted in the window. Every safe arrival home is an affirmation that we're just where we need to be.
I'm just starting to ramp up for our 5th Christmas here. Each year has included a little less heartache. That first year we had the distraction of being buried beneath a mountain of snow on Thanksgiving that didn't diminish until January. After all the presents were opened, and each child was off exploring their new treasures, I cried quietly to myself for a while. That first step out of our old life was exhausting, and terrifying, and unavoidable. But we landed in the arms of Christmas Town, so everything was OK.
Its been OK for us ever since.
Blessings to you and yours during this time of great change. There is such suffering unfolding in many parts of the world it can be hard to think about peace right now. I hope we can all nourish the warmth of universal love that this holiday season represents for so many of us, and find ways to translate that love into real healing for the world.