2025 Christmas Story

Once Upon A Time there was this roadrunner...

My father-in-law leased a four-hundred-acre ranch for his crossbred cattle herd to graze.  His son and I had recently married and blended our three children to make a family.  The father offered us an old abandoned, single-board constructed ranch house to live in rent-free, which turned out to be freezing cold in the winter.  Cold air and rain blew in not only between cracks in the walls but also through numerous knot holes that had lost their wooden centers many eras ago. I hated having peepholes in both bedroom and bathroom walls, although the kids thought it was pretty neat.

The husband, whom we’ll call Earl, promised me he would tear down the “Leaning Pisa” car shed  northwest of the house before it collapsed around the three small children who ran in and out of it in their constant play of bad guys versus good.  But he never did.  Looking back I’m thankful it didn’t fall down on its own until we’d been there through the first December of our marriage.

The yard grew only rocks, and the front and back jagged-edged sidewalks had four-inch drops on either side because all the dirt had long ago washed off our hilltop estate.  You had to be careful not to step awry when coming in or out.  The short walk from car to house carrying a kid, or groceries, or laundry, became doubly dangerous when Earl decided he’d place two populated beehives in the side yard.  Then triply dangerous, when the two hawks I’d raised from fledglings—and then, stupidly, taught to land on a leather armrest—grew to full-sized birds and threatened to land on any moving human that dared to use the back sidewalk.  (Poor Sharla Beth is still to this day frightened of bees and leery of flying birds.)

The wooden front porch on the east side of the house was a good four-feet off the ground and it was lumpy, bumpy with its array of warped boards.  Some sections had rotted out and never been replaced.  Sharla Beth attempted to ride her tricycle on it when we first moved in, but I had to stop her, as I’d quickly grown tired of having to pull the front tire out of numerous holes. 

We could have parked in front of the house and navigated the holey front porch, except for another reason.  Several times a week we either saw a snake curled up on the porch or found a shed snakeskin—which meant that during the years the house was unoccupied, the snakes had claimed it as their own.  On the rare occasions the children were to want to play out there and risk falling through the rotten boards into a twilight zone, I preceded them and repeatedly beat two metal pans to get the snakes to shoo—thinking all the while that this was what pioneer women had to do way out on the wild west prairies.

Come to think of it, it did feel like we were alone on a prairie; we didn’t have much by way of trees or visitors. The propane delivery man that came around every few months scared off all the town people that might have visited.  He told a much-exaggerated tale of two mean-eyed hawks that kept trying to land on him when he was attempting to fill our propane tank.  I tried to assure him that if he’d just toss them a chicken, or maybe the meat from the sandwiches I was sure his good wife made for him each morning, that the hawks would leave him alone.  He was not amused and had insisted we find another propane service.

My family stayed away because my picky aunt, who always brought her own bed linens, bath towels, and cleaning supplies came to visit us first.  Aunty had arrived before I got home from the grocery store and had been trapped inside her shiny new car by the herd of rangy cows.  This woman, who by her country raising should have known better, had been continuously honking her car horn trying to get our attention inside the house.  Her excuse for not going up to the door when she first arrived was that she refused to step out of the safety of her car with a pair of red-tailed hawks sitting on the fence rail, staring at her as if she could be their lunch entree.  This was not the welcome committee that Aunty was expecting.

With her honking she had managed to annoy the bees, make the hawks flap their wide wings and intensify their stare, and notify the entire herd of cows of what they thought was the call to come get hay. When I drove up they stood in a tightly packed herd wrapped around her car, mooing and tossing their sharp-horned heads, mad that they hadn’t yet been fed. Seeing her predicament as I was driving up, I passed them up and honked the car’s horn repeatedly to lead the cows on down the road to the barn where I gave them a few chips off of a hay bale. 

I managed to carry Sharla Beth on my left hip and get Aunty inside the house by first throwing our flock of  chickens some feed a few hundred feet away from the house.  This distracted the hawks long enough for us to scurry by as chickens were an okay lunch for hawks if I wasn’t offering them something fresh killed from the pasture. But trying to keep Aunty from swatting  at a close-circling bee was dang hard.  Lucky for mine and little Sharla Beth’s ears, she quit emitting those most annoying short, sharp screams after I told her that a bee might fly into her mouth if she didn’t zip it.

As Aunty looked around inside the house, I could tell she was not entertained by the idea of spending the night.  But her take-charge nature felt the need to do something to rectify my sorry living conditions; she decided to at least rid the house of its bacon smell.  While I was running the hawk and bee gauntlet to get groceries out of the car, Aunty opened the front door wide and propped the screen door open with a rock I kept handy for such rare occasions. I’m sure little Sharla Beth was arguing with her the entire time and warning her not to go out there, but she failed to listen to my two-year old.

Stepping onto the porch and looking over the rock hill we called home, she tripped on one of the lumpy boards.  Recovering, she glanced down and let out a scream.  The bumpy porch hadn’t tripped her!  The problem was a large black bull snake stretched out absorbing the warm sun, his tongue flicking in and out in annoyance at her clumsiness.  She came back inside screaming for me to get a gun. (She never visited us again.)

But the old front porch did have one in its cheering squad.  Several mornings I’d noticed a roadrunner with muted feather colors, denoting she was female, hopping up on the north end of the porch and seemingly tip toeing across it as close to the east outside edge as possible.  If a snake were sunbathing  she would snatch it up right behind its head with her strong beak. The snake would immediately wrap itself around her neck but, undeterred, she would hop down off the porch and then easy-peasy take air long enough to fly over the yard fence. The last glimpse I would have of her would be her brown tail feathers proudly waving bye-bye as she ran down the road toward the thickest cedar of the ranch. 

One would think the hawks would help the roadrunner clear the front porch of snakes, but that never happened.  Their hunting ground was the back of the house, where their food had beaks and not fangs. But neither the danger of being bitten nor the ever-thinning number of snakes kept that fearless roadrunner from checking out her hunting ground.

The children were home on Christmas holiday when the roadrunner showed me a trick that was special about our old porch.  Apparently the earth was turned just perfectly for making the sun rise in a certain spot when this occurred. As the roadrunner was tip toeing across the edge of the porch, her much-magnified shadow gradually made its way across the side of the car shed, causing me to nearly faint the first morning I saw it.  The sight had immediately brought flashbacks of Alfred Hitchcock’s terrifying movie The Birds that I’d seen at ten years of age.  

Knowing my three kids had never seen that movie, I took a chance the next morning that they wouldn’t have nightmares about giant angry birds and roused them from their beds before the sun came up. Refusing to let them doze on the couch, I made them stand near me and watch for the roadrunner, thinking that she might return since she’d left empty-handed yesterday.  I kept repeating that it would be worth the loss of sleep if they could just keep their eyes glued on the car shed. 

She didn’t disappoint us.  So intent on trying to keep all three children’s eyes open and facing toward the car shed, I was just as surprised as they were when the silhouette of the snake-stalking roadrunner moved slowly across the wall.  All four of us made noises between awe and fear.  Pulling the three pajamaed bodies up against me I whispered, “Keep watching and wait for her return.”  In a few very short seconds we were rewarded with the coolest ever shadow of a sleek roadrunner exiting the porch with a wiggling snake’s head and tail protruding from opposite sides of her neck.

No one said anything for a couple of long seconds. Then I heard Mark say, “That was cool.”  And then Kevin, the child with a quip for everything asked, “If we keep looking, will the coyote run by next?” 

This unusual sight was cool enough just in itself, but later that same day something happened that turned this little tale into a Christmas story.  Kevin was chasing Mark and Sharla Beth with a loaded water gun he’d dug out of the bottom of a toy box.  Since I’d been the one to make them put on their coats and go outside, even though the temperature was in the mid-forties, I hated to chastise them for having fun. 

Since it wasn’t really water gun weather, the two littles had hopped up on the south side of the porch, run as fast as they possibly could across the length of it, and successfully made it off the north end onto rocky ground.  Kevin had been in hot pursuit but wasn’t as lucky.  From my post at the ironing board standing in the center of the house I heard the crash and subsequent yell.  Going out front I found Kevin half on and half under the porch.  Quickly I pulled him out, thinking all the time that he was going to be bitten by the den of snakes that surely lived beneath our house.

When he was dusted off and found fang-hole-free, the three children and I crowded around and peered into the hole.  After retrieving Earl’s spotlight, we spent considerable time shining it into the unknown world beneath the house.  I was thankful that although there were several fragile transparent snake sheds below, no live snakes were visible.  But what caught our eye was three badly decomposed cardboard boxes over near the north side of the porch.  Leaving the children the light to fight over and threatening them that I’d turn cartoons off for a month if they so much as stuck a finger under the porch, I hopped off near where the roadrunner took her leap each time she visited.  Examining the wood underpinning of the porch I found what I was looking for—a small, hinged door that our predecessors had used to get underneath.  Apparently they’d used a portion of the vast space as storage.

Even though I was literally scared to death of what would jump out at me, I made the children stay up on the porch while I jimmied the door open.  Using a tree branch from the yard I dragged the decaying boxes out from under it.  Once they were out in the open, I shut the door and threatened in my no-nonsense voice that the children had better NEVER open it again.  After watching the boxes for any movement, and then with the help of the branch, I opened the flaps on all three boxes, a job that was easy to perform since the cardboard was almost at the crumbling stage.

Using long plastic kitchen gloves I turned each box upside down and shook out their contents.  I didn’t have to tell the children to stay on the porch again after various-sized spiders and a stinging scorpion came crawling out of the debris searching for the dark world they’d been living in.  It was easy to see by the red plastic poinsettias and dark green ribbon now laying on the ground that the boxes held long forgotten Christmas ornaments.  Standing as far away from the items as I could reach with the branch, I stirred the contents trying to find anything of value.  The children quickly grew tired of watching and went back to peering into the Kevin-sized hole in the porch.

All in all, the only thing in the boxes that didn’t need to be discarded was a plastic nativity scene with a barn about four inches tall. The paint had nearly all flaked off, leaving the figurines of Joseph, Mary and Baby Jesus  the same brown color as the barn.  Surprisingly the gold hanging cord was still shiny. Sitting it on the edge of the porch I carefully put all the rest of the junk into the large paper sacks I’d brought from the kitchen.  These sacks were going straight to the burn pile.

Knowing I couldn’t get Earl to do anything about the hole in the porch when he got home, I did what I had already done about covering a hole in the back screen door.  I retrieved another well used cookie sheet from the drawer under the oven and after first pre-nailing holes through the metal in the corners, I lightly tapped it into place over the gaping hole, afraid the whole time that I’d only make the hole larger.  I had to admit that the cookie sheet looked completely out of place not because it was a cookie sheet, but because it was the only flat surface on the whole lumpy-bumpy porch.  I couldn’t help but smile at the thought of what my picky Aunty would think of my new porch addition.  Seeing the little manger scene where I’d left it, I decided to let it air out until tomorrow and then I’d bring it inside and give it a good soaking. 

I wasn’t sure how long the earth would be at this perfect point in space to cast the roadrunner’s shadow but I knew it couldn’t be long. Again the next morning I insisted the three children get up and join me in the station by the window.  The boys were quite full of complaints that they’d already seen the shadow, but little Sharla Beth simply chattered on about Santa Claus’s imminent visit and what kind of toys she was hoping he would bring.

With all our minds occupied elsewhere we four almost missed the roadrunners return to the porch. Catching just the last glimpse of her giant tail’s shadow clear the car shed, I quickly placed my hand lightly over Sharla Beth’s mouth and whispered, “Everyone be real still and real quiet.  The roadrunner is up on the porch already but keep looking out the side window at the car shed for her return.”

Oh my!  Did that roadrunner ever put on a show for us! The sun was in the perfect spot to work like an overhead projector. When the roadrunner walked onto center stage and stood there as if she was being introduced to the audience, her much-enlarged shadow joined her on the car shed wall.  We watched spellbound as she slowly walked to her right as if she were going to hop off the porch but stopped and turned her head back to the left.  Following the point of her beak I could see what had caught her eye now that she’d vacated center stage.  No, it wasn’t a snake coiled and sunning itself in the morning rays; it was the manger scene sitting on the far side of the porch.  What captivated us humans was on the car shed wall—the actors in that long ago Christmas scene, the scene that gives us the warm, fuzzy feeling of peace each time we see it, were magnified many times over their actual size.  And, around the edges of the figurines, rays of sunlight bounced off the wall backlighting it with a golden glow.  It was beautiful.

Slowly the roadrunner began to move toward the manger as we four stood still and held our breath in anticipation.  The giant bird shadow grew gradually smaller as she walked toward the far edge of the porch.  Soon the ratio of bird to creche was comparable—even though they were still filling the bottom half of the wall with their shadows.   Then the roadrunner did something none of us saw coming.  She sped up her walk, thrust her head forward causing her lengthy tail to rise and counterbalance her move.  We watched her long, much-exaggerated beak pick up the manger scene by its gold cord.  As close as she was now to the porches’ edge it took only one hop for her to disappear off the side and out of range of the bright illuminating rays.  The wall before us went blank.

Not wanting to miss her full retreat, I none too gently pushed the three kids off to my sides and hurried to the front window.  She’d already flown over the fence and was trotting off down the road, the little creche hanging from her mouth swinging in step with her running feet, her head held high so as not to drag it on the ground.  The roadrunner was taking Joseph, Mary and Baby Jesus home with her!  The children ran into the kitchen to start their morning argument over which cereal was the best, leaving me standing in the living room with my mouth still ajar, wondering:  What in the world was our bandit roadrunner going to do with the manger scene?  I was stumped………….

I’ve had that conversation with myself dozens of times since the shadows appeared on that wall and I’ve tossed around many a scenario.  Here are my favorite endings—let me know if you write one of your own.

If this were a Texas tall tale, then it would have ended something like this:  “And forever more, during the Christmas holidays the roadrunner and her family hung the manger scene in their cedar bush and sang carols worshiping our Lord in four-part harmony.”            But it’s not a tall tale…. this story really happened.

And if this story’s location had been set within trotting distance of Luckenbach, Texas, it could end with a line or two that goes like this: “And on every Friday and Saturday night, from the first night the little manger scene hung from the bottom limb of a cedar bush some forty feet from Willie’s stage, the Holy family were a captive audience to the best country music in Texas. And they didn’t mind.”             But it didn’t happen near Luckenbach.

What I think is the perfect ending to my story in which a Texas roadrunner carries off the most precious replica of the greatest scene ever written in time is this:  She was simply fulfilling the scripture            Psalm 150:6, which reads: "Let everything that has breath praise the Lord."   She took it back to her cedar bush, somewhere in the east pasture of a dusty 400-acre tract, deep in the heart of Texas, where it still hangs today. And every creature that passes by and sees it STOPS and does just that. 

​

2024 Christmas Story

The Perfect Seat at Christmas

I have an odd thing going on with my eyes that started last April.  My eyelids will suddenly decide they’ve seen enough of the world and slam shut! First the right eye, then the left, and  I’m stuck staring at the back of my eyelids up to four or five minutes. Thankfully, months later, its tapered off to mostly happening on Sundays when at church someone says, “Let’s pray,” and my lids automatically close. But when the prayer is over, my eyelids force me to stay in that lightless place until I’ve had a really good talk with God.   

And their habit of both of them shutting while I’m in bed has resulted in comical recordings being captured by the Ring camera at the front door. Turning Buttons out to chase the moon in the dead of the night, I’m often caught passing by the camera while holding one of my eyelids open with my fingers.  It looks as if I’m forcing myself to look at something my eye does not want to see!   

After eight months of specialists, I haven’t learned anything conclusive except that my facial muscles are tired.  One of my best friends (ha, ha) said maybe my muscles were tired because I’ve talked so much for seventy-three years!  Since her diagnosis sounds less scary than all the “maybes” I’ve heard from doctors, I’ve decided that I’ll try to zip my lips more often in 2025. 

I’ve spent quite a bit of time this year really listening to what’s going on around me while my lids are closed, which reminded me of a little girl I thought I’d met quite by chance more than a decade ago.  Come meet Tiffany……

When I boarded the Southwest flight in El Paso, I was surprised to find an open aisle seat so near the front of the packed plane, especially on the Sunday following Christmas.  I quickly claimed the seat and was delighted to see that I’d be sitting with my favorite kind of people: children.  As I maneuvered my body into the small space and struggled to lengthen the belt, I noticed that both girls were wearing lanyards that proclaimed them unaccompanied minors.

The dark-haired girl in the window seat glanced up shyly at my loud greeting, while the blonde in the middle seat replied with a warm hello.  I’d forgotten to turn down the volume of my voice after spending five days in a house occupied by my granddaughter, Abigail, who was hearing impaired. I beamed at the girls with a friendly, grandmotherly smile, but I quickly realized that the blonde girl in the middle seat was gazing back at me with blue, sightless eyes.  Glancing into her lap, I noticed an odd-shaped book about twelve inches square and two inches thick; beside it I saw the end of a long white cane wedged between the girls’ plane seats.

The seeing-impaired blonde was a chatter box.  She told me that her name was Tiffany and the girl in the window seat was Maria.  Both girls were nine years old, and they had boarded in El Paso. Maria had been visiting her father and was returning to her mother in Austin.  Tiffany informed me that she’d been making weekend trips for three years between El Paso and the School for the Blind in Austin.  She said if I looked around, I’d find several of her schoolmates on this same flight.

When I turned and scanned the other passengers on the plane, I noticed a boy in his teens sitting across from us and back one aisle.  He held a book that looked quite similar to the book in Tiffany’s lap. He was holding the cover open just enough for his right hand to fit inside, and his fingertips raced across the page.  As Tiffany told me about her family and her beloved dog, I watched the teen’s facial expressions change from intense, with his brows furrowed tightly together, to relieved, with his face slack and relaxed.  Since I had recently started publishing some of my manuscripts, I was curious what book the young man was reading so intently.  I felt sure he was reading an adventure story.

When Tiffany took a breath, I asked her about the oversized book in her lap.  She said it was one in a series about a cat named Tobias.  She beamed with pride as she told me how many words she could read in a minute, and she sat a little taller in her seat as she added, “And I can read with either hand.”

Two-handed reading?  I wanted to know more about her reading skills, but I also wanted to learn about the teenager behind us.  How would I accurately describe the young man to a blind person?  I couldn’t state his size, his hair color, or his clothing.  Choosing my words carefully, I told Tiffany that a teenaged boy sitting behind us was holding a book similar to hers.  If he was her classmate, might she know the title of the book he was reading?

Tiffany quickly asked, “Does he have on glasses?”

I had actually turned to check when I heard her giggle.  The little toot had been pulling my leg!  To my surprise, I heard laughs from a few passengers seated closest to us.  That’s when I realized two things: Tiffany had a great sense of humor, and we were talking too loudly.

After Tiffany finished laughing, she told me that the boy behind us was Gabriel, and they had traveled to and from Austin on the same plane for years.  While they’d waited to be pre-boarded in Austin on their way to El Paso, he’d said he was aggravated that he couldn’t bring the eight volumes in Braille that it took to record the 784 pages of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.  I was shocked—eight volumes!

Tiffany reached for my right hand as the engines lifted us up off the tarmac.  Then she laid her book flat across her lap and placed her fingers atop mine. As she guided my fingertips around the page, she explained which raised dots stated the title, author, and page number. I asked if I could hold the book.  When she passed me the volume, I was surprised at its weight, and understood why Gabriel couldn’t carry eight volumes of Braille in his carry-on luggage--the paper had to be thick to allow for the pattern of raised dots. 

Once the plane leveled out and the engine noise faded into the background, I felt Tiffany’s hand atop mine once again.  She flattened my fingers and told me to lightly touch the raised dots which were grouped in little bunches.  As she slowly raked my fingers left to right across the page, I noticed passengers across the aisle leaning forward attempting to see  Tiffany’s demonstration.

I told Tiffany about a book I wrote for my granddaughter, which included a few signs in sign language.  Tiffany bounced in her seat and asked, “Will you teach me the signs as we fly toward Austin?”

As the plane sped through the sky, I forgot all about trying to be quiet as I recited an adventure that  Abigail and Rumpus the Green Dinosaur shared on County Line Ranch.  I took turns between the two girls helping them learn the signs for  Abigail, dinosaur, dog, cat, pig, and the color green.  I’d had a sinking feeling when teaching Tiffany the sign for green—since color wasn’t something you could feel in order to understand its meaning.  But Tiffany practiced it right along with the other words and quickly both girls became proficient in the signs.

Of course, when I declared the story finished, Tiffany begged for another one.  I replied that she’d have to be patient while I thought about the mystery stories I’d written for each of my grandchildren.  I wanted to find one that included signs that I could teach the girls.  While I thought about which story to tell, Tiffany opened the book in her lap and soon her fingers were flying across the page.  It was mesmerizing to watch her read!  Her fingers were her eyes and her windows to the world.  I felt an overwhelming sense of awe at the perseverance it took for this little girl to transform those tiny, raised dots into a reality that she’d never seen.  I dug one hand through my pants pockets to find a tissue and tried not to let Tiffany sense my tears as I quietly wiped my face.

Suddenly Tiffany turned toward me and asked, “Can you tell us a scary story?  I love those the most!”

I recited the chapter titles from my manuscript called County Line Ranch Mysteries and let Tiffany choose which one she wanted to hear. She chose one entitled One Scary Saturday that I’d written for Matthew, my first grandson.  My heart took a dip as I ran over the lines in the story. I was pretty sure I could explain cow, goat, barbed wire, and the strong clasp of a metal trap around an animal’s leg.  I could manage the explanation of a creeks cold, swift water, and I could describe the refreshing coolness of standing beneath a huge oak tree.  But could I explain fresh, mushy, smelly cow patties and how terrible it was to step in one?  One of the main clues as to what type of animal lived in that tree was the lack of cow patties beneath it, pointing out that the cattle were afraid to rest under its shady branches.

Having already promised Tiffany the story, I had no choice but to try. 

I took Tiffany’s hand and taught her the signs for cows and goats.  I traced a fence across her open palm and told her the pointy barbs felt like sharp pinches. I put her hands together and showed her how an animal trap worked and explained its sharp, powerful teeth.  Lastly I told her about cow patties.  I knew I’d succeeded at describing a cow patty as both girls were shaking their heads and wrinkling their noses when I finished.  I didn’t teach them the sign for mountain lion, as I didn’t want to give the story away.

As I progressed through the story, I could tell by the taut lines of Tiffany’s face that she was feeling the suspense.  Finally, I asked the girls if they had any idea what animal had been killing Grandpa Eddie’s goats.  Could they guess what type of animal might have been lying quietly on a limb while my grandchildren and I wandered around underneath in its cool shade?  Both girls remained silent.  When I added that the animal lived high in the tree, had claws that shredded a limb, and must bury its poop because we couldn’t find any droppings, Tiffany exclaimed, “It’s a cat!  Maybe a great big cat!”  I took her hand and said the word lion while showing her the sign.  I was pleased when both girls shivered in their seats.

I continued with the story and described how the grandmother realizes that they might be in danger, so she quickly gathers the children and tells them that they may have invaded an animal’s hunting ground.  As they hustle back toward the ranch house, they hear a big creature approaching them and panting loudly.  It nearly scares them all to death, but when they finally turn around, they see a big shaggy ranch dog named Sunshine instead of an angry lion.  Both girls laughed with relief, just as my grandchildren had done in real life.  Tiffany began to clap her hands, and to my amazement, I heard claps coming from several seats around us.  In the intensity of my storytelling, I’d forgotten that we were even on a plane. 

Tucking my head in embarrassment, I watched Tiffany reopen her book and lay her hand upon the dots.  When she didn’t start running her hand over them, I wondered if perhaps she was rehashing my scary story.

Suddenly, I was afraid.  Had I placed frightening images inside her fertile mind? Would my description of a mountain lion have her, or Maria, unable to fall asleep tonight as she envisioned a huge cat hovering above her?

Seeking to end our commute on a happier note, I asked Tiffany, “Do you know the sign for Santa Claus?” I showed her how to hold her hand in a loose claw up close to her chin for his beard, and then bring it down and touch her chest with her finger to signify white.  I explained that it was two simple signs that when used together meant white beard.

Tiffany said, “That was an easy one.

“You know, my mom explained Santa Claus when I was little, and she took my hand and rubbed my belly to show me that he had a big stomach.  This year my little brother, who is sighted, told me that Santa Claus was fat all over, not just his belly.  That made Santa change shape in my head from a man with a pooched-out belly to a round man with fat arms, face and legs.  I was a little frustrated with my mother because I’d carried around the wrong impression of him all those years.”

Tiffany leaned closer to me so Maria couldn’t hear and whispered, “But I know, now, that it doesn’t matter how I picture Santa because my older brother told me Santa Claus isn’t real.  He’s just something big people made up to scare kids so we’d always be good around Christmas.”

Now I leaned closer and whispered, “Tiffany, do you believe in God?”

“Yes!” she proudly replied. “We go to church, and my Sunday school teacher helps me see Bible stories.  She paints really good with words!”

“Wonderful! Then let me ask you this, just because I’m curious: Is it hard for you to believe in God when you can’t see all His great creations in this world?”

She giggled so loudly that I almost asked her to stop.  Then she exclaimed, “You’re funny!  We blind people have to believe in zillions of things we cannot see!  Our whole world is based on what others lead us to believe in.  Some people, like you, work hard to help us see.  Like I told you, my momma works hard not to mess up again like she did with her description of Santa Claus.  And my daddy, well, he’s the best!  Once he helped me feel our dog Mandy when she was having puppies, and although my brothers were scared, I wasn’t.  All they remember is the yuck that was on the puppies when they came out of Mandy.  What I remember is the miracle of feeling a tiny dog being born right into my hand!  If I could see, I’d be a veterinarian and deliver lots of puppies!”

She leaned toward me again and whispered, “I’m old enough to know that my parents put all the Christmas presents under the tree, not some fat man with a white beard.  And I’m smart enough to know that nobody on this earth poked those little puppies into Mandy’s belly.  Only God could have grown them there.”

Settling back into her seat after that revelation, she smiled broadly and stuck her hand back inside her big book of Braille. My mind raced as I thought about how I could reuse her explanation about the surety of God’s existence.  Her confidence in Him inspired me. Tiffany was going to make it just fine in her sightless world.

However, I was still worried that I’d told her a scary story that might keep her up at night.  I fretted over my possible mistake, until right before we landed, when Tiffany set my mind at ease.

In a voice loud enough for the passengers around us to hear, she announced, “I have a friend at school named Margaret; she is both deaf and blind, and she misses out on so many things!  I’ve always wanted to be able to do more than squeeze her hand.  Now I can make those signs you taught us, and she can follow my hands.  With the help of her teacher, I’m going to tell her a true-life mystery, and a story about a green dinosaur named Rumpus with a voice that only a little deaf girl named Abigail can hear.  I’ll get her teacher to finger spell into Margaret’s hand that the stories are a Christmas present from me.

“And cow patties!” she declared loudly. “I can tell Margaret about cow patties!  And when we’re on the playground, I’ll stick her shoe in a mud pie.  I know right where there’s a leaky faucet and I can lead us there.  Just wait until she sees what that feels like!  Too bad we don’t have a real cow patty so we could both smell it.”

For once I regretted that the plane landed on time in Austin, as I was left wondering how many more lessons Tiffany and I could have shared with each other.  As I watched an attendant from the Texas School for the Blind corral four children and lead them away, I again felt tears running down my face.  Tiffany had given me the best kind of present—the kind that didn’t arrive wrapped in a box under the Christmas tree.  With her promise to share my stories with her deaf and blind friend, feisty little Tiffany had filled all the passengers within hearing distance with the warm, fuzzy feeling of kindness sprinkled with a heavy dose of love.  Like God, friendship is invisible, that is, unless you open your mind wide enough to believe in what neither the sighted, nor the sightless world, can see.

This memory is now ten years old, so maybe Tiffany is pursuing a career in deaf education and making mud pies for her students when they learn the sign for cows.  No, that’s not quite right.  The toot named Tiffany wouldn’t make those pies out of mud.  She’d bring the real thing into class, and she’d laugh loudest when she heard their gags. 

If I could talk once again with Tiffany, I’d tell her that although I’ve known but a few moments of blindness, her belief in what she cannot see amazes me even more now than it did ten years ago.  She spent all her years seeking the vivid texture of life through raised dots and intently listening to the words of others. I’m slowly finding out that what the sightless world lacks in color, can quickly be filled in with sounds that  the sighted never hear. Your sense of touch is so heightened that you can actually feel the greatness of life through your hands. Touch multiplied Tiffany’s amazement at the puppies being born and intensified her happiness in being able to tell a classmate a story with her fingers. When my eyes refuse to open after prayer, touch points out the kindness I feel through hands leading me to a chair, and highlights the compassion of the good friend, next to me on the church pew, who helps me pass the offering plate. 

I now know that I didn’t meet Tiffany by chance!  And I’m not afraid of my closed eyelids because one time at Christmas, on a crowded Southwest plane, God saved me a seat right beside Tiffany.  (Patty Kramer 2024)

 

 

 

 

 

 

2023 CHRISTMAS STORY

A Texas Christmas Play

LaFreda Perry talked over her shoulder as she scrambled breakfast eggs, “Here’s what’s happening this last week before Christmas; you six grandchildren are going to be in charge of taking care of the nativity scene. 

“I’m counting on you to take the responsibility of the nativity barn seriously.  Even though it is life-size and some of you may consider it a perfect playhouse, it is not a place to play.  You will need to have it swept, and any trash picked up by 10 am every morning before visitors come by.

Before dark you will need to turn on the three floodlights, and then at 10 pm every night you will need to shut them off. When you go on the last run, take flashlights and check the barn thoroughly to be sure nothing has wandered inside before you slide the doors shut.

“While you’re on the scene, you need to practice your parts for the Christmas Eve play. I know some of y’all have repeated the same lines for years, but Christmas is 100% about the birth of Jesus and the story doesn’t change!”

Timmy, the youngest and most vocal of the group said, “But couldn’t we at least add a talking sheep or maybe a dove singing O Little Town of Bethlehem?  I bet the audience would like to see something different.”

“Nonsense!” said LaFreda.  “The play is fine like it is.  Each year it reminds our community of the responsibilities that come along with believing in Christ’s birth.  The lines from the six actors are meant to take your mind off Christmas gifts and focus on what Christianity is all about.”  

“But the play is boring!  Even the old men in the crowd go to sleep leaning on their canes while we’re talking. It needs new lines.  It needs action!  Please think about letting us do something different this year.” Begged Jonathan, the oldest of the boys.

Six pairs of eyes belonging to Dolly, Jonathan, Jesse, Eva, Olivia, and Timmy rested heavily on their grandmother.    

Finally, she gave in, “Okay. This week I’ll give you the chance to rewrite the lines.  But no matter what you come up with, the story must clearly spell out what Jesus expects us to do to portray a Christlike spirit.

She added sternly, “Don’t get all silly-willy on the rewrites. Agreed?”

After breakfast, the grandchildren went to the nativity. Jonathan used a whisk brush to clean dirt off the wooden figurines of an angel, Joseph, Mary, the Baby Jesus, two shepherds and two sheep. Jesse used a broom to knock down the latest spider webs from the tall corners, and Dolly used a jeweler’s cloth to polish the angel’s halo. Timmy and Olivia scattered clean hay beneath the figurines, and Eva shook out Baby Jesus’ soft blanket and lovingly tucked it around Him as he lay in the manger.

For six consecutive nights, right before dark, Jonathan and Jesse went down to the nativity scene and turned on the three floodlights. Around 10 pm, all the children went to the nativity to turn them off. Once there, a different child from the night before took their flashlight and went inside the barn to make sure all was well. What they found inside those six nights provided the children with new material for the Christmas Eve play.

The day of the play, as laughter erupted repeatedly from the living room as the grandchildren practiced, LaFreda did her best not to worry about what those new lines might be as she busied herself in the kitchen.  She sent up a silent prayer that both the gathered crowd, and especially God, wouldn’t be offended.

That night as darkness fell around the nativity, the crowd became quiet as the Mayor stood on the wooden stage in front of it and read the story of the birth of Jesus Christ from the gospel according to St. Luke 2:1-20.

After he’d finished, Jonathan assumed the role of MC by welcoming the crowd to the Christmas play and introducing the actors.  He ended by raising his arms and declaring, “Please enjoy our Texas Christmas Play.”

The first actor was Timmy, and as he stepped forward, a long broom rested across one shoulder. He said, “I am a follower of the eastern star. I arrived first at the barn and found a newborn baby lying in the manger. I knew him to be our Savior, Jesus, and bowed my head in worship, regretting that I had no eloquent words prepared to tell Him of my love.

When I opened my downcast eyes after my prayer, I found a menagerie of mice busily shredding the corners of Baby Jesus’ blanket.”  

Timmy began frantically sweeping the ground with the broom and said, “My first instinct was to send them scurrying out of the barn and into the cold night, but I remembered I was standing beside the Christ Child. The scripture from Isaiah 58: 7 came to mind; Give clothes to those who have nothing to wear.  And even though these were but lowly mice, I gathered the shredded pieces of our Savior’s blanket and placed them in the back corner of the barn where the mice could find them. Hoping the pieces would soon become the warmth inside of a mouse’s nest. 

“Looking once again into the manger, I saw drops of water where Jesus’ tears normally should appear. Was it because I shared His blanket with the mice?”

Exiting, Timmy allowed Olivia to take center stage. She was twirling a red flyswatter and carrying a flashlight. Holding the flyswatter still she said, “I am a follower of the star in the eastern sky.  I arrived second at the barn and found a newborn baby lying in the manger. I knew him to be our Savior, Jesus, and bowed my head in worship, regretting that I had no eloquent words prepared to tell Him of my love.”  

Turning and shining her flashlight toward the front of the nativity, the beam stopped on an oversized, armadillo-shaped stuffed animal that had come from LaFreda’s toy room. Olivia said, “When I opened my eyes after my prayer, I was startled by a hungry armadillo digging in the ground. Armed as I was, I raised my left hand to spotlight a way out of the barn while raising my right in preparation to swat at the armadillo’s hard shell, planning on prompting him toward a hasty retreat.” At these words, Olivia acted as if she was spanking the backside of the armadillo with the flyswatter.

She continued, “But I, too, remembered that in Isaiah 58:7 we are instructed to feed the hungry.  And although armadillos are known to be enemies of lawns and gardens, I took my snack pack of trail mix from my coat pocket, spread it on the ground beside the nativity, and herded the armadillo toward the food.  

“Passing back beside Baby Jesus, I saw drops of water glistening where teardrops should appear. I ask you; Do you think it was heavy dew leftover from the morning? Or happy tears shed from a Savior because of my kindness?”

As Olivia moved out of the spotlight Eva stepped forward. “I am a follower of the star in the eastern sky.  I arrived third at the barn and found a newborn baby lying in the manger. I knew him to be our Savior, Jesus, and bowed my head in worship, regretting that I had no eloquent words prepared to tell Him of my love.  

To my surprise when I opened my eyes, I found tucked beneath the feet of the two shepherds, two long-eared jackrabbits.  These hares believed themselves to be hidden, because they’d flattened their long ears up alongside their heads and were sitting very still.

“I was armed with both spotlight and a baseball bat.” Eva stuck the flashlight between her knees while spotlighting Timmy and Olivia who were off to the left of the stage down on their knees, faces turned away from the audience, and sitting very still. Eva pretended to take several practice swings toward their heads as she continued, “and I considered bopping them toward the light.”

Waiting for the ripple of laughter to die down, she continued by saying, “But I remembered Matthew 5:16 that says, let your light shine before all people so that they may see your good deeds and glorify your father.  

“And although they were but rabbits, thinking mistakenly that they were hidden, and no matter that they couldn’t hop away and spread the word of God, I chose to shine my spotlight toward the nearest exit and I nudged them out of the nativity with my shoe.”  Eva removed the flashlight from between her knees and nudged the two rabbits. The rabbits hopped away.

Turning back to the audience she said, “Passing back beside Baby Jesus, I saw drops of water where teardrops should appear. Was it my care for the two misguided jackrabbits that brought those happy tears?”

After Eva, Jesse took the stage saying, “I am a follower of the star in the eastern sky.  I arrived fourth at the barn and found a newborn baby lying in the manger. I knew him to be our Savior, Jesus, and bowed my head in worship, regretting that I had no eloquent words prepared to tell Him of my love. 

When I finished, something on the ground caught my eye. I found a trio of fox kittens rolling about in play with their long red-tipped tails trailing in and out of the space at Mary’s feet.”

Taking off his coat and holding it out by the shoulders he said, “I went to use my coat to toss over them and capture them tight, thinking about caging them and calling them pets, when I remembered the verse Luke 6:31 Do unto others what you would have them do unto you.  So instead, I used my coat as a bullfighter uses his cape and hurried the fox from the nativity.” Jesse shook his coat and yelled “Ole, Ole” to the imaginary fox as he herded them off stage.

“Passing back beside Baby Jesus, I saw drops of water where tears normally appear. Were they there because I let the fox run free?”

As Jesse left, Jonathan came forward, causing a stir among the audience because of a large hunting spotlight in his right hand and the toy deer rifle swinging by a wide leather strap across his left shoulder. 

He said, “I am a follower of the star in the eastern sky.  I arrived fifth at the barn and found a newborn baby lying in the manger. I knew him to be our Savior, Jesus, and bowed my head in worship, regretting that I had no eloquent words prepared to tell Him of my love.  

“With my eyes still downcast in prayer, I heard a noise which made me shine my bright spotlight toward Joseph. I was in shock when I found a twelve-point buck standing dumbly beside Joseph, blinded by the headlight, a doe lying by his side.”

As Jesse shined the bright spotlight’s beam to the normally vacant space beside Joseph, Jesse appeared. Laughter broke out among the audience as they saw he was resting a board mounted set of whitetail deer antlers atop his head. Lounging on the ground at his feet was Eva with a deer hide slung across her back.

When the laughter died down, Jonathan continued, “And although I knew I could run quickly and retrieve Opa’s deer rifle, and I wanted, oh so wanted, the trophy antlers of that magnificent buck to put on my man cave wall, I remembered a Bible verse that had me frozen in my tracks.

This time laughter erupted from the other three actors standing offstage. Jonathan made a wry face and then came clean, “Actually, I heard Dolly say loudly behind me as I continued to shine the spotlight into the buck’s eyes, “Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful. Luke 6:36

“So instead of shooting him,” at these words Jonathan put on a very sad face, “I backed away from the nativity and removed the bright light from the deer’s eyes.  And as he and his doe raced away,”(Jesse and Eva raced off stage), “I made my way back beside Baby Jesus lying in his manger.  Gazing once again into His face, I was surprised to find water drops where teardrops should appear. Were they there because I did not take up my gun?”

Jonathan walked offstage and Dolly took his place. In her arms were a warm quilt and a flashlight. She said, “I am a follower of the star in the eastern sky.  I arrived sixth at the barn and found a newborn baby lying in the manger. I knew him to be our Savior, Jesus, and bowed my head in worship, regretting that I had no eloquent words prepared to tell Him of my love.  

“At amen, and since my fellow worshipers had encountered creatures from our Texas’ woods in their visits, I looked carefully into the dark corners of the barn with my light. My beam found not an animal, but a homeless man lying in some scattered hay.  He had his face turned from the light and appeared to be asleep.” Turning her light she placed the beam on one of the boys wrapped in a tattered coat lying on the floor of the nativity.

“Greatly startled, I turned to go home with the intention of calling the Sheriff, thinking that this stranger shouldn’t tarry inside such a place as this.  Stopping in route when inside my head I heard the voice of Mrs. Earp, my Sunday school teacher, repeating one of the first scriptures we children ever memorized; Matthew 22:39  Love your neighbor as yourself.  The scripture made me ask-- wasn’t this weary traveler my neighbor in Christ? Would I wish to spend a night in jail for merely seeking a warm place to sleep?”

I went back to the farmhouse where we children gathered food, warm drink and a quilt.  The boys brought it back to the nativity and placed it inside the front doors before they slid the doors shut for the night.  The next morning the food was gone, and the empty thermos rested on the neatly folded quilt.

I found no tears in the eyes of Baby Jesus, but tucked under the thermos atop the quilt was a long white feather, as if from a heaven-sent dove. Was it there because we children had treated the trespasser the same way we would have if he’d been a guest in our grandmother’s home?”

Quietly, Dolly walked off stage.

The stage was empty for a full minute. Then the six actors walked onto it, each carrying the prop they used in the play.

Timmy said, “We believe we have each portrayed a Christlike spirit, although it might only happen in Texas. Mine was to give to the needy. I did so by not sweeping.” He made a couple of swipes with his broom, then tucked it under his arm.

Olivia said, “To be patient and kind. I did so by not swatting.” She swatted at the air for a second or two, then held the flyswatter still.

Eva said, “To think only of others. By not batting.” Assuming a batter’s staunch, she prepared to strike at a ball, but stopped mid swing and put the bat down by her side.

Jesse said, “To act as Jesus would if He walked among us. By not capturing.” Opening his coat wide, he acted as if he would throw it over something on the ground. Instead, he folded the coat over his arm.

Jonathan said, “To show mercy, by not shooting.” Taking careful aim at something off stage, Jonathan let his finger hover over the trigger. Then he stopped and slung the gun back over his shoulder.

Dolly said, “To refuse to harm our fellow man. By not tattling.” Opening and closing her mouth, and raising her finger as if deep in gossip, she stopped and stood quietly.

Together the six children ended by bowing and saying: “Merry Christmas! We hope you and our Grandmother are pleased with our new version of the Christmas play.”

Their grandmother LaFreda clapped loudly along with the rest of the crowd. If one of the children’s flashlight beams had hovered upon her smiling face, they would have seen water where teardrops normally appear.