Christmas Memory

Gentle Reader, I will ask you to bear in mind that in the early 1960's we did not have weather technology as we do now, and polar vorteces ,or whatever we call them, were not something we got warnings about at the time.  I'm certain if my father had known that temperatures were going to drop the way they did that night that he would have changed his plans.

 THIS Was prompted by hearing a rich conservative girl share her Christmas memory on a talk show; she "bought the wrong plane ticket and ended up in New York when the rest of her family was in Florida for the holiday."("Oh NO!  Poor little rich bitch!"I thought uncharitably, and then, "So RELATABLE!"Again, very uncharitable-very judgmental, as a broadcaster.

My backwoods Christmas memory stands in vivid fucking contrast to: buying the wrong plane ticket.

But I was only about six years old.

My father took me with him to cut our Christmas tree, and I was thrilled to join him.  It was my first year being invited, and I felt very grown-up.

He parked the truck by the bog, near the hill, fortunately, as it turned out(this was around eight miles from town, for reference).

Bog lands are good for hunting Christmas trees because the tree growth is more sparse and you can get one with a pretty even 360 degree round growth.  You just have to know the ice.  My Dad, being a thirty-year game warden in the Rangeley Lakes region, knew.  We wore snowshoes.  It was very cold that night and getting ever colder rapidly;the wood was brittle and gave easily, nearly crumbling. The tree came down quick.  He tied it down securely in the truck bed, tossing our snowshoes after it..  Then, after a few minutes in the truck cab, he came to me, breathless.  I had heard some thunks and slams but wasn't sure what they meant.

i knew it was getting a lot colder, and fast,but I didn't know what that meant.  I had been staring at the stars and hopping around, trying to get feeling back in my toes.

My father seized me by the shoulder, his breath pluming across my face.  His pale blue eyes, watering with cold and effort,  glittered in the dim starlight.

"We have to push the truck to the top of the hill so it will roll down, so I can jump in and start it," he breathed,  "And when it starts rolling you need to run and jump in and close the door.  You can't slip on the ice and fall and stay behind.  You can't have a coughing fit and stop and stay behind.  

"If you stay out here tonight  even for an hour you will die.  If we get stuck out here tonight we will both die."  

His fingers dug into my shoulder, even through his glove, even through my jacket.   "You can't stop and have a coughing fit or you will die. If I try to come back for you and we get stuck we will both die.  Do you understand?"  

"Yes Daddy."  My heart began jamming against my ribs, just like when the doctors gave me adrenaline shots in the hospital to stop attacks.  I started to feel dizzy.

I was a severely asthmatic child.  Deadly asthma runs in my family.  My father's uncle Ray died of an asthma attack at thirty-five.    I spent over a third of my early childhood in hospitals in oxygen tents.

"Don't let me down, Robyn."

"I won't, Daddy."

"Good. You need to push harder than you have ever pushed anything and not slip on the ice and not fall.  When we get it rolling, I have to jump in and get it started.  And you have to jump in the passenger side and slam the door shut.  I can't turn it around and come back for you.  Don't fall down and don't stop for anything.  Do you understand?  We need to push.  Right now."

My boots slipped on the ice, but I dug in.  We pushed.  The truck moved.  

My father ran, jumping into the truck.  I ran.  Of course he had opened the passenger door and left it barely closed.  I jumped in.  My father grabbed a handful of my jacket over my chest, hauling me across the seat and under his arm.  Then he reached past me, crushing me, to pull the door closed, locking it.  

"Put your seat belt on!"  he growled.  I did.

We fishtailed on the icy road, the engine roaring , as my father walloped the truck onto the main road, gunning it in front of an oncoming logging truck.  

I sucked on my inhaler the rest of the way home, hacking, trying to calm my burning lungs.

We made it home.  A few times I craned my stiff, aching neck to check if the Christmas tree, the carefully chosen tree, had made it.  It was still strapped down in the truck bed, branches shivering and trembling as if it felt what I felt while the Albuterol raced through my body.

We pulled into the driveway.  l in a full-on asthma attack, trembling and gasping,draining my inhaler.

"Get in the house." my father said.

When I went inside my mother said, "God, why did he have to go tonight."

The next morning the headline of The Portland Herald was something about Temperatures Reaching Forty Degrees below Zero and In Lake Regions and Farmers Report Livestock Losses.

My mother had something to rant about that morning.  But we had a beautiful Christmas tree.

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