Singular Continuity, A Christmas Story

Snow blown ice particles stung my skin and forced my eyes closed.
Well doesn't that feel great, I thought bitterly, removed my wool-lined
leather gloves, wiped my eyes, and examined the red door they had
slammed in my face. The polished brass numbers seemed as cold as the
ice. My attempt to reconnect with old friends ended abruptly.
I walked off the three-step porch, and stared up at the front of the
gaily-decorated house. Holiday lights neatly outlined the structure
sparkling under a thin coating of snow. I read again the large red and
green lettering that stated Merry Christmas as if the day, Christmas Day
held a special significance for the occupants.
Clearly not, I decided, at least not beyond spiked eggnog and
Christmas morning pleasures.

I wasn’t so old I could not recall the feeling, nor was I so young that I
still believed that Christmas Day was all about me and me alone.
We often went to church the night before, Christmas Eve midnight
service. I enjoyed the singing, the dark mystery of the manger scene
assembled off to one side of the nave. Our minister wore a thick black
and silver beard, smiled more than most, had a rich sonorous voice that
filled the rafters with his words, although, the rafters hung low in the
small ancient building.
No longer did I recall the sound of his voice, but I could still picture
his face, his wide grin, which occasionally made me believe that he knew
something vitally important and that the knowing filled him with a
particular joy he alone experienced.
Recalling the church interior was easier. It was old dark reddish
brown wood with a low ceiling, exposed hand-hewn rafters, and lighting
that resembled rows of flickering candles hung overhead in small
wrought iron candelabras.
Well they didn't really flicker, but childhood imagination made it so on
that special night.
The altar was simple, nothing ornate about it, as was the crucifix
above. The simplicity made the sacrificed Jesus easier to examine, easier
to accept as once having been a flesh and bone man with the courage
many since envied but never achieved.
What I enjoyed most was the white altar linens with their rich
resonant colors chasing the borders. Every season, each church holiday,
new linens would appear. For me the purple of Easter was best.
At the midnight service, few of the normal Sunday congregation
attended, but we did not care. Somehow that made it feel more intimate,
as if the building embraced us, welcomed us for braving the cold star-
encrusted night, the new snowfall and occasional ice to huddle within its
ancient walls. From the basement, the sound of the furnace rumbled
lightly underfoot as its uneven appreciated heat wavered between rows of
pews.
I would sit in a pew alongside my mother, kneeling when directed by a
phrase, the minister's hand movement, while I touched the curved top of
the scarred and varnished seatback, wondering how many people had
felt that surface before I had. A deep scratch perhaps dug accidentally
from someone's ring as she turned to leave, seemed like a clue as to who
was there in earlier times.
Once, I spied tiny initials grooved into the wood just beneath the
seatback top, where it curled back, under, and down. The initials were
A.P.C. I tried to fill in the names, and finally gave up and made the three
letters into a word, which I recited to myself for days whenever I recalled
the moment of discovery.
The old faded red hymnals and songbooks felt rough, heavy with worn
smooth edges. Some had small tears in pages at the top or bottom where
the page met the spine. More than one person dog-eared corners at
favorite songs, I guessed, and several book had names written on the
inside front cover, or the rear cover along with "donated by."
One name that stayed with me was James Matthew Tyler. I had
learned in school that President Tyler had cousins who lived in the
neighboring town back when he was alive. The family lived there long
after.
Is this one of them? I thought, but never learned the answer.
After church, we returned home, made hot chocolate, finished
decorating the tree with long strands of tinsel, flattening each one before
hanging it so it individually moved in the air currents to reflect glittering
light from the colored bulbs nearby.
Our tree was most likely scrawny in places, which we turned to face
the wall. When completed, all of the room lights went off. The tree's lights
sparkled with renewed promise bouncing off hundreds of tinsel icicles,
filling the room with their hope, glowing with promise beneath the angel
sitting at the very top. There was magic there and then. I knew it and
believed it would last forever.

Backing down the sidewalk, I examined the windows, but did not see
as much as a curtain shiver. No one inside cared who might be outside,
or if they did, must've decided those who braved the elements on
Christmas Eve were either insane, criminals or beggars.
God forbid beggars should ring a doorbell on Christmas Eve, I thought
disgustedly, and turned to walk to the street.
God may not be dead, I added grimly, but Christmas, well that might
be another story.
Wind continued to pick at my hair, flipping strands that hung loose
from under my rolled navy blue woolen cap. I jammed my hands in my
heavy coat's pockets, and waded through ankle deep snow feeling icy
moisture as it began to leak over the tops of my boots.

2
 After my failure to gain entry, I realized I no longer had a goal.
Strangers now filled the village that I once called my hometown.
They had taken the time to decorate for the holiday, but each house
bore strings of white lights that resembled dangling icicles. White light
silhouette Santa and reindeers stood like sentries on nearly every lawn. A
few entry doors stood decorated as large wrapped gifts with bows to
obscure the peepholes these strangers felt were necessary.
I saw large balloon-like snowmen, kept erect by a pump that blew hot
air into them, at the corner house where once my closest friend lived.
The snow around it had melted like an ugly wound to expose the
bleakness below.
I kept on walking hoping the wind might at least die down. My car sat
parked down by the harbor, several long blocks away.
The best thing for me to do, I thought, is get away from this
neighborhood.
With a nod, I turned onto a dark side street. Well, it wasn't dark, but
compared to where I had just been, the difference was significant.
Only two or three houses wore Christmas decorations. None looked
like their neighbor. One had strings of large colored bulbs draped around
windows, a fence, and one evergreen tree to the right of its narrow white
front door, which had two small windows set in the top. Behind the
windows, yellow-white light flickered invitingly.
The second house had smaller colored bulbs, but twice as many as
his neighbor as if he wanted to make up with volume what each bulb lost
in glow. He had decorated two skeletal maple trees on the front lawn.
One sat on either side of the sidewalk, which approached the entryway.
The third house had a candle in each window. I stopped to count and
reached twenty-four before seeing the huge lit tree inside the house. It
sat behind a high bay window, round and fat in the middle, tapered to
the top where an angel treetop sent rays of light outside as if somehow
the golden light it created was meant for any person fortunate enough to
pass by during the night.
I didn't know how long I stood watching, nor did I hear the side door
open, footsteps crunching along a snow covered walkway.
"You're early," I heard a deep sonorous voice proclaim.
"Early?" I asked without looking at the man who spoke.
"Yes you are," he said, and I heard something in his voice that
quivered emotion deep in my chest.
"Midnight service doesn't begin for another twenty minutes," he added
kindly.
I spun around, shocked and delighted, stared at eyes that still
twinkled but did so now above a silver and white beard. His face seemed
the same but age had remolded him with the skill of time and his
experiences.
I felt speechless, and my plight must've been obvious to him.

3
 "Come, you can help me light the candles. And we'll need to turn up
the heat. There should be some warm cocoa ready too." He reached out
and placed his hand on my shoulder, moved it just enough to cause me
to react by turning to follow him, which was when I saw that the side
road I turned onto led directly to the old church I once attended as a
small boy.
As I walked into the building behind him, the odors and sights sprang
back from the distant past, and became the present.
He flipped on the lights, which dimly illuminated the entire building,
and as we walked along the aisle, I quickly glanced under the edge of one
pew back and smiled when I saw the initials A.P.C.
"Merry Christmas," I whispered to my past, my present, and laughed
lightly when I straightened and struck a match to light the first candle.

Copyright December 20, 2009: Larry Schliessmann all rights reserved. This story is
not to be copied. It is for your own personal use. If it is sold by you or given away by
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