This is the sixth chapter of a holiday series that started Monday, November 27th.

Grandma Nolan was up long before the sun. The tuna hot dish was just coming out of the oven when the others began to stir and make their way to the chrome percolator for a hot cup of Folgers to wake them and warm them. Everyone was toast under the mounds of quilts and blankets, but found their blood was thin once they freed themselves from the bounds of the handiwork of generations of women who came before them. The coffee was a welcome source of heat. Before long, everyone in the house had taken their three minute turn in the bathroom and were putting on layers of clothes to ward off the winds and blowing snow outside. Grandma was pulling the bread out of the oven and wrapping it in foil when Bobby and Betz burst through the front door.

“Let’s get this show on the road!  The snow will all be melted if we don’t hurry,” he yelled as he headed to the coffee pot.  Kristen, Kyle, and Kim all looked at their parents for clarification.  Being lifelong residents of Fort Stockton, they weren’t sure if that was really how snow worked or not.

Grandma got a cardboard box from the basement, lined it with quilts, and placed the bread and the foil-wrapped hot dish inside, along with a Thermos full of coffee, a plate of Christmas cookies on top of that. Paper plates and cups went on top and then another layer of quilts. Dana watched the entire process with a silent bewilderment and admiration. “Better keep moving,” she whispered to Doug. “Stay still long enough and you’ll be wrapped up in an old quilt and placed in a cardboard box.”

“I think the quilts breed and reproduce in the basement, garage, and attic.”  Doug noted.  “They’re everywhere.”

As each grandchild made his or her way to the kitchen they were handed a plate of flapjacks, link sausages and fresh fruit cut up to look like a Christmas scene, the sausages being little reindeer, a cherry on the nose of the one in front on each plate. A bowl of Chocolate Malt-O-Meal topped it off. “Have to start the day with a hearty breakfast, especially in this cold,” she said as she made each plate, a one woman assembly line.

Ann and Don were the last to emerge from their room, Don leading the pair to the kitchen in nothing but a pair of boxer shorts that probably had been the right size when he bought them.  That had been a while back.  Dana went to find him a quilt.  Stan appeared mysteriously from upstairs, poured a cup of coffee without saying a word or making eye contact with anyone and trudged back up the stairs to his room in the attic.

Kristen, Kyle, and Kim watched the entire scene unfold as they ate the Christmas food-scene off the plates Grandma only got out at Christmas and thought they might be in an episode of The Twilight Zone.  Not having been exposed to extended family before, they weren’t sure what to make of the characters involved.  Nonetheless, they were looking forward to a day with Bobby and Betz and experiencing real winter.  The fact that they would be free of their parents for the day made it even a greater treat.

The quilted box of food and a small ice chest of bottles of milk were loaded with extra quilts piled in the back. All the kids were bundled and assigned seats in the Country Squire. Suddenly half of the brood was gone. The house felt larger. “Do we even know where he’s taking our kids and our new car?” Dana wondered out loud as she watched Bobby gun the big Ford wagon on the slick street through the picture window, tires spinning and kids squealing all the way down the street.

“Pretty sure he’ll stay in Michigan,” Doug joked.  

She would have replied, but out of the corner of her eye she noticed Don reach down and scratch himself in a way that should have remained private and behind closed doors.  Then he grabbed a few sausage links with the same hand, rather than the silver tongs laying right there on the tray.  When he looked up and saw Dana watching, he smiled and put two back.  “Just coffee for me,” she told Grandma Nolan.

Doug, Stan, and Don were the next group to depart, wanting to get to Tony’s Hardware early and back so the restoration work could begin.  Dana had never seen so much flannel all in one place in her life as they headed out the front door and piled into the odd looking Rambler wagon and headed towards Hazel Park for supplies.  Of course they didn’t know it at the time, but it would be the first of four different trips to try to get the right materials, counting on Stan’s expertise.  Doug thought it odd that Stan had worked with the guys at the hardware store for eight years, but he didn’t introduce them to him or Don.  Well, he understood not introducing them to Don.

While “the boys” were on their maiden voyage to the hardware store, Dana, Ann, and Grandma wedged themselves into the Mustang to head to the mall. Dana got behind the wheel, the only one knowing how to drive a stick, though it had been years. Grandma rode shotgun because of her back. Ann was in the back, her knees up under her chin. It would have been a tight fit in the middle of summer. Outfitted in boots, sweaters, caps, overcoats, and gloves, the Mustang looked like the dumpster at the Goodwill Store had been emptied into the car, only three small pasty faces giving any indication there were humans somewhere in the pile.

“You sure you know how to drive this thing, Dana?” Ann asked from the backseat.

“It’s like riding a bike,” Dana replied as she shoved the shifter into first, ground the gears, and finally launched the Boss 429 down the street like a rocket, nothing like riding a bike. Grandma grabbed her back. Ann grabbed her stomach. It was an interesting trip to the mall. Dana dropped the two passengers at the grand entrance, right in front of the Salvation Army bell ringer, so there wouldn’t be any witnesses as she tried to park the flame-red Mustang. Finally finding an extra wide parking spot that would give her the room she needed, it was a three block walk to join the ladies inside, once she finally got the Mustang parked. Her ears, fingers, and toes had lost all feeling by the time she got to the entrance. “I’ll never cuss the Texas heat again,” she said out loud, not caring who heard.

The brood in the Country Squire headed to Alpine Valley, snow covered hills, and an adventure of a lifetime.  Bobby’s buddy owned a small cabin at the end of a winding road at the bottom of the hill.  Being used to driving the Mustang rather than a huge wagon full of human distractions, Bobby misjudged the speed at the top of the hill, not to mention the amount of ice coating the road.  Halfway down the hill he applied the brakes, pumping them like a madman till the Squire slid off the side of the road, hit three trash cans and finally coming to a full stop buried in a snowbank, the front right fender guided into place by a small pine tree.

The kids shrieked, not out of fear or concern, just at the sheer, unbridled joy of the trip into the snowbank.  Little Kim, holding a bottle of milk during the mishap, had let it go as the Ford barreled into the snowbank, its contents being released into the front of the cabin and all over Betz’ sweater and into the loop carpet below.  The possible damage to the family car never registered to the kids.  Betz giggled and looked over at Bobby, who shrugged, smiled, and got out to access the damage.  Unperturbed, he yelled, “It’s drivable!  Probably going to need some help getting the front end unburied.”

Betz and the kids got out, went around to the Magic-Gate rear door and started unloading the day’s provisions for the trudge to the cabin. Bobby unlashed the sleds and snow saucers from the roof rack and followed the gang to the front porch where he found the key “hidden” in a porch light and let everyone in. Kyle glanced back at the dented and buried front end of the new Ford and told Bobby, “Dad’s going to shit!” His cousins looked at each other hearing Kyle drop the S-word as though a bolt of lightning was about to strike him. When it didn’t, they laughed for the first time since they got to Michigan.

“Probably so.  He’ll get over it.  It’s Christmas,” Bobby said.

Kyle wondered how someone only five years older than he was could be so cool.

Betz, Kyle’s sisters, and his two cousins helped unload provisions while Bobby made a fire in the big stone fireplace. Kyle stepped into the bathroom right off the only bedroom to relieve himself. While inside the bathroom he realized he hadn’t shut the door all the way when Betz entered the bedroom. Her back to him, she peeled off the wet, milk-soaked sweater and stood in front of the closet looking for something else to put on. The thought of pulling the door closed never once occurred to him. Realizing her bra was also soaked, Betz unclasped it from behind, let it fall to her wrists, folded it and turned around to lay it on top of the sweater already on the bed.

There would be few events that would ever take place in Kyle’s life he would remember with the clarity and detail as that one. There was an audible gasp that came from his inner core that he feared would give him away. While it would have been worth it, he nonetheless remained undetected. It took a moment or two for Betz to find something suitable to put on, the cold having a noticeable effect on her, which had a noticeable effect on Kyle. She soon found a cream colored fisherman’s sweater that she slid her arms into, raised towards the ceiling, and pulled over her head of thick blonde hair. Grabbing the wet things from the bed that she’d taken off, Betz made her way out of the bedroom.

Kyle realized that not only was Uncle Bobby the coolest man he’d ever encountered in his entire life, he was the luckiest man on the entire earth.  A god among men.  He couldn’t even imagine what it would be like to swap places with him, if only for an hour, but he tried to for a long time after.

The afternoon that followed was to be remembered by everyone else, as well, but for different reasons. Sledding down hills, warming by a fire, drinking hot chocolate in front of a roaring fire, eating piping hot tuna casserole with potato chips crumbled on top, and getting to know blood relations they’d never met before filled the buckets of everyone in the cabin. By the time afternoon came, Bobby felt compelled to make a phone call to get help to free the Ford from the snowbank and head back to the house in Ferndale.

The kids didn’t want to see it end.  Partly because they were having such a good time, partly for fear of their father’s reaction when he saw what had happened to his new car.  Kyle thought about accidentally spilling something on Betz again, but thought he’d be pushing his luck.  Bobby found a number on a pad next to the phone in the kitchen that read “SNOWPLOW”.  He called it, gave the address of the cabin, and hung up.  “Twenty minutes.  Maybe a half hour,” he told the assembled crowd around the kitchen table.  They filed into the living area and gathered around the fire to watch it go out.  Bobby poked the fire, causing it to flame up again while he looked at Betz.  The symbolism was not lost on Kyle.

Forty minutes later, a huge yellow Frandee Sno-Shu rumbled to a stop out front of the cabin.  Provisions, what remained of them, were loaded into the cabin of the beast, and then the seven people who’d spent the day together in the snow.  The Sno-Shu made its way back to the rear end of the Country Squire and the driver hopped out the side door and drug a thick, rusty chain over to the bumper.  He found someplace under the Texas license plate to hook the chain to, not seeming to be too delicate in the process.  He opened the driver’s door of the Ford, put it in neutral, and then climbed back up into the Sno-Shu.

The snowbank was unwilling to give up its prey at first. It took a couple good tugs before the Ford was spit out. It was probably the second tug that slightly bent the bumper. Hardly noticeable, Bobby thought, though he could notice it from his seat in the Sno-Shu without any problem. The Ford slid back and forth on the icy road like a fish flopping on a dock, all the way to the top of the hill where it was safe to untether it and let it resume the journey home under its own power. While all the passengers took their seats back in the Squire, Bobby settled up with the driver of the big plow and thanked him for his efforts.

Back at the house, Grandma was back in the kitchen, relieved to have made it back home and convinced she’d never get in another Mustang as long as she lived.  She was making three batches of lasagna, a huge garden salad, garlic French bread and cherry pies for dessert.  She fretted over whether there would be enough for everyone.

The repairs to the bathroom, the hallway, and the ceiling in the closet in the basement had actually gone smoothly. Stan and Doug worked together on the main floor, Don down in the basement. Don seemed to take a lot more breaks for snacks, or sodas, or eventually a cold beer or three, but they got everything done by the time Bobby returned home with the kids, and that had been the goal. Occasionally Stan and Doug would share stories about their dad, or growing up in the house, or what their favorite things were that their mother cooked. Stan told Doug about taking his mother out in the Sunliner when the weather allowed, and how much she enjoyed it. Doug felt like maybe there was a reason the toilet had gotten clogged; he wasn’t sure they’d have had the time to visit otherwise.

Upstairs together in his old room to change before dinner, Dana told her husband what she’d discovered during her time at the mall.  “Don’s been out of work for a while.  They’re struggling.  She probably would have packed up the kids and moved back to Ferndale if she hadn’t gotten pregnant,” Dana told him.  “I feel bad for her and the kids.”  Perry Como’s voice singing White Christmas on the Magnavox hi-fi in the living room made its way up the stairs and seemed to take the edge off the news.

“Have no idea why she married him in the first place. Would have understood if she’d have left him. But, there’s a reason she got pregnant and stayed,” Doug said. “We might never know what that reason is, but there was one.”

The grandkids all ate their dinner in the basement on the TV trays in front of A Charlie Brown Christmas on the black and white TV.  The adults bunched in around the kitchen table, elbow to elbow.  There was plenty, even with Don getting seconds of everything.  Everyone was surprised when Stan didn’t go up to his room as soon as the meal was finished, but instead stood next to his mother at the kitchen sink, drying the dishes as she washed each one.  They both looked out the kitchen window at the snow falling and savored the moment.

Bobby and Betz, Dana and Doug, Ann and Don eventually got out a couple decks of cards and began playing 21 Card Rummy, laughing about doing the same when they were kids. The Christmas lights on the neighbor’s house came on and reflected off the snow falling outside. Grandma Nolan thought about how lucky she was to have all her children home for Christmas, and how much she wished her husband was here to see it.

She handed Stan the last big pot to dry as he looked out the window at the same scene.  A moment later, he said, “Doug, what happened to the front of your new Ford?”

If you’re enjoying the series, or the blog in general, consider buying the Captain a cuppa Folgers to help offset the costs of keeping it running. Happy holidays.