The Reindeer Keeper

Early in the morning of the day before Christmas I was in the grocery store. I was in a hurry as it was the last place I wanted to be. Standing by the meat counter I happened to look up. Coming towards me was a man I'd see now and then in various places-in stores or walking down a street. Whenever our paths crossed I'd always say hello but never received a response. Never saw a smile. Never made eye contact. In my mind I'd written him off as ornery. So whe n I saw him coming down the aisle I turned back around and continued my shopping. I forgot about him until I heard someone say, "You can always count on needing a few more things before Christmas. You're smart being here early." It was the ornery man talking to me. It had to be me I thought. I was the only one in sight. I was so shocked I didn't reply. I didn't have to. He kept talking. "You might think I'm out early getting ready for Christmas dinner. Well I'm not. No Christ...

When I graduated from high school I was clueless as to what I wanted to do. My mother insisted I enroll in a local college for girls run by nuns. It was small. I could live at home while I figured it out. I didn't want to go there but I finally took the step. I was tired of my mother asking, "What are you going to do?" Turned out it wasn't so bad. There were lots of interesting girls there from all over the place. I never liked high school but soon discovered this was different. Since I lived at home and since I had an older brother who drove a little TR3 and often came and picked me up, I was quite popular. Many of my new found friends took turns staying at my house when weekends rolled around. And some of those weekends included 'Mixers' with fraternities in colleges nearby. This was really lots of fun-especially one Mixer. That's when I met a guy from Niagara Falls. He was quite possibly the cutest guy in the place. He asked me to dance. Not once. No...

For whatever reason, certain Christmas gifts stand out from others received over the years. Sometimes those remembered the most aren’t necessarily the most expensive. Cars, jewelry, trips. They all cost a pretty penny. But the one gift I remember in particular cost less than a quarter. That’s because it didn’t matter what was wrapped inside. What mattered was it came from my older brother. We grew up in a house sitting alongside a lane surrounded by other houses mostly occupied by young families like ours. Because the street was on a bit of a hill, whenever a blizzard closed the schools, we’d all be sliding down the street on toboggans and sleds. Even though there was no fireplace, our home was the perfect location for Santa to visit once our father went to the attic and carried down a cardboard imitation. We’d get so excited as pretend flames started back up again when batteries were in place. On Christmas Eve we’d tape our stockings to the cardboard mantle after leaving...

Simple things sometimes come with memories of a time-a person-a moment-even simple things like Jam Tarts. After filling her pie plates with crusts kneaded to the right consistency, my grandmother would gather the leftover dough and shape it into small balls. Then she'd take her wooden rolling pin and roll the balls out one at a time. When all the little balls were flat on the flour-covered counter, she would fill them with her homemade strawberry jam, fold the edges into the center and put the tarts in the oven of her woodstove. Anticipation would mount as the sweet aroma of jam and cinnamon blending into the dough filled the kitchen-the dining room-every room of that farmhouse. Once the jam tarts were pulled out of the oven, cold milk was poured into tall glasses. Then piping hot strawberry jam tarts were enjoyed. It didn't matter what time it was or if it was a sweltering summer day. They were enjoyed as much as any fine desse...

Growing up there were a few decorations I'd anticipate their return for yet another Christmas season. I loved the angel chimes. Once white candles were lit underneath little brass angels, the angels would move around and around and as they moved they'd strike little brass bells. The little bells would then respond with a most beautiful sound. The angel chimes always sat in the middle of the dining room table. In the home where I grew up before moving to the country, we had a cardboard fireplace. My brother and I would eagerly await our father carrying the fireplace down the back stairs in sections from the attic. We'd watch as he'd put it back together and place it in the second room of the double living room where it sat every year. The pretend yule logs would 'burn' whenever they were plugged in. Santa always knew where to find our stockings on Christmas Eve. Once we moved to the country, that cardboard fireplace disappeared. Our new home ha...

My family had a few Holiday traditions. The most delicious tradition was my grandmother's Christmas bread. The most fun tradition happened right after Thanksgiving dinner as dessert was being enjoyed. I don't know who started it or when. It was just something we did that became a tradition called Table Trees. Preparing for Table Trees began Thanksgiving morning when sheets of paper were cut into strips. On each strip the name of a family member was written. While it differed who wrote the names on the strips, it most always was a younger member of the family doing it. After every family member's name was on a strip, the strips were folded a few times and placed inside the ceramic Thanksgiving Santa Claus which was then put some place secure until the dessert was being enjoyed. When I was little  it seemed as if the adults would never finish talking and eating so the ceramic Thanksgiving Santa Claus could be brought out and the fun could be underway. Again it ...

When playing school out in the country in our chicken coop schoolhouse void of chickens and filled with the chalkboard, books, and desks from an abandoned one-room schoolhouse, my cousin and I often shared the responsibility of teaching our 'class' of younger siblings/cousins. When they were not attending class their desks were occupied by invisible students who had pretend names and participated with enthusiasm. Sometimes too much enthusiasm. But all w ould quiet down when I read them a certain story set in Lapland from the Barne's New National Reader titled, "A Reindeer Drive." Actually I didn't read it. I made a story up and showed them the picture that went with the story-a reindeer running while pulling a small sleigh. For some reason I loved that illustration and decided to enhance it by letting my imagination take over. The pretend students loved it! They asked me to read it again and again and so I did. I still have that book. The copyright is 18...

Because my father was a Funeral Director back when funeral directors were always on call we rarely went on vacations. When we did it was unusual if we went very far. The North Pole was only two hours away so we made that trip a few times. Every time was magical. Of course Santa Claus lived there. Although I knew that, one year on Christmas morning I was convinced my father was the real Santa. The night before had been disappointing. Oh family members came. Piles of presents were under the tree. I hung my stocking and put the milk and cookies out with my brother. But it was raining outside. Any snow on the ground had been washed away. I'd never known a Christmas without snow in all my seven years. Besides the lack of snow, my father had to work. He made it home just as our mother was telling us it was time to get ready for bed. I was standing by the Christmas tree when he came in soaking wet. After pulling a package out from under his coat, he took th...

Mr. Rogers once said, "Play is really the work of childhood." Growing up in the country my cousins and I were playing all the time. Not with toys, but outside, taking advantage of what nature provided us every season of the year. We never went to Disneyland. We never even thought to ask to go. Why would we. We had our own theme park. In the winter we'd be skating on the creek just out back and down the hill. It didn't matter how cold it was. That never stopped us. We'd even be down there skating at night. With the moon above and the stars glistening that was the best time of all to go skating on that old creek that turned into a waterway in the summertime-providing us even more fun as we'd guide our rafts made from telephone poles on endless adventures. It was named Sucker Creek for a reason. Whenever any of those suckers got on our rafts we'd take our steel poles used for steering the rafts and cast them back into the murky water. Fall proved to be ju...

Funny what you remember growing up. At the time it might have seemed insignificant but looking back some of those memories prove priceless. My grandmother filled what little idle time she had using her hands to create. Crocheting to sewing-to braiding rugs-it didn't matter. In the evening she'd sit in her chair and her hands became her instruments. That generation never wasted time. There was no time to waste. Little did she realize that some of what she created would live on to tell her story-a family story-to generations that would follow. That especially rang true of her braided rugs. Growing up we were aware that no garment was too old to be considered a candidate in one of her braided rugs. Before anything was thrown out, it would go to my grandmother. She would make the decision if it would get that second chance. More often than not, it survived her test. After that initial 'interview' a garment would be stripped of buttons, zippers, bias tape, rick rack-anyt...

I grew up using a typewriter. I must have been eight or nine when I'd take my brother's typewriter into my room-shut the door-and spend what seemed like hours at my pine desk my grandfather made me one year for Christmas typing my stories. The typewriter was the last stage of my process as I'd have the stories written out on lined paper and ready to go under my penname of Maggie O'Shea. I often wonder whatever happened to those early masterpieces or the notebooks with my scribbles. Or that typewriter my brother never knew I borrowed without asking. The use of notebooks continued as I grew up. And so did the use of typewriters. I loved the process-the art of typing. Loved the sound of keys hitting the paper and the bell dinging at the end of a line telling me to pull the shift arm to go back and begin another line. White out was a blessing. If I didn't have any I'd go looking for an eraser. If I couldn't find an eraser I would pull that particular sheet o...

Since being blessed with two beautiful grandchildren a tradition has taken hold and continues every year about this time. We pick a Saturday or Sunday to go out back and harvest the pumpkins. The only problem this year is the lack of pumpkins. I've only found seven and that just won't work. So this week my son and I went on a search for pumpkins. With roadside stands-commercial businesses and Amish farms, pumpkins are not hard to find. We chose to ride down a back road and find an Amish farm. And we found the perfect Amish farm. So perfect that I went back a few more times. They know me now. They wave Hi as I pull up in front of their sprawling mass of beautiful pumpkins. Of course having little Amish children running around barefoot adds to the backdrop. Soon we will be going out back to "pick" pumpkins. Little will those grandchildren know that most of those pumpkins are imports. All they will see will be a mass of orange ready to be touched and patted and brou...

Funny how something simple can trigger memories-like the old steel manual grinder my mother would bring out from a kitchen cupboard during the Holidays. Taking all the parts out of the cardboard box, she'd give them a good washing before she attached it to a leaf of the table and put it all together. Then she'd place her big yellow bowl on the floor underneath it to catch the juices from whatever she'd be grinding. For Thanksgiving that meant cabbage and carrots-maybe an onion; for Christmas that meant cranberries, oranges, and apples. We all loved doing the grinding-especially the cranberries because they popped when going through the grinder and the juice would squirt all over the place. When my mother wasn't in the kitchen, I'd load it with cranberries and grind them as fast as I could. It sounded like fireworks-blending right in with whatever Christmas album my mother had playing in the other room. Among the vegetables my son brought home the other day from ...

FAMILY TREES AND TREES: Still to this day the rustling of leaves on poplar trees takes me back to my grandparents' farmhouse where stately poplars lined the cinder driveway. When Halloween came around, those trees and their skinny branches way up high became witches and black cats-goblins or monsters especially when an orange moon lit up the night, casting spooky shadows over the fields. With four houses of relatives all in a row, it became a summer tradition of joining suppe rs in a particular backyard full of scotch pines. The shade was welcomed as was the scent of those trees as salads and hotdogs-hamburgers and all the trimmings were enjoyed. Later, while adults sat around enjoying a cup of coffee, the kids would play baseball-running from one tree to another. From a big old tree sitting on the banks of sucker creek, holding our rope swing in its grasp so we could run real fast, take a leap, grab hold of the rope with our hands and situate our feet on the knot at the ...

When recently walking down a certain aisle of a discount store, I found myself drawn to all the school supplies filling the shelves. Signs shouting special pricing-great deals-hurry while supplies last-were everywhere as were children with parents obviously immersed in Back to School shopping. And there I was-still infatuated by all those products just as I used to be when I was the one taken to the store to shop for Back to School. When it was me, it was never the clothes or shoes that interested me. It was always the pencils-the erasers and glue and paper and scissors and notepads and folders. All those aromas of all those things coming together was exciting to me. Besides going back to school, it meant spending even more time at my desk in my bedroom-writing-drawing-creating whenever I could. Back then there were no official discount stores. We had a Newberry's and a Woolworths. They sat side by side in our downtown. Everyone would go from one to the other when doing Ba...

I never knew about the left side or the right side of the brain when growing up and despising arithmetic. I just knew I could not stand columns of numbers with plus or minus signs or some marked with an X or others with another sign. I never had enough fingers to use when counting. There was no wiggle room when getting the right answer. It had to be exact. Two and two always equaled four. This thing called exactness was why I preferred English-preferably writing. There's lots more freedom. You aren't tied to a formula. Your answers-your essays-whatever it is you write-is all yours. No one else will have the exact same story or essay as yours. I liked that. Life is not exact. Why should what you do be exact? My distain for arithmetic-for adding, subtracting, multiplying and dividing-took a nasty turn once I had to take Algebra. My disdain for exactness had met its match. I was horrified by formulas and rules that made no sense and questions I did not understand. My mother as...

When I was twelve, my mother gave birth to my younger brother in the month of May. Shortly after that she was stricken with a blood clot in her leg and hospitalized for a good part of that summer. Thankfully we were surrounded by family. I pitched in the best I could. Once school got out, that summer was all about pitching in. That's when I started to do the ironing. I'd watched my mother iron. It was more of an art form to her and to her mother and sisters. Whatever it was that my mother was ironing, she'd spread it out on her ironing board as if getting a game plan together in her head as to how to approach the item. Then she'd pat it down-wet her finger and then touch that finger to the iron. If it made a sizzling noise it meant the iron was hot enough for her to proceed. Back then, the ironing board was either up all the time or close at hand because everything was ironed. Bed sheets-pillowcases-towels-everything or anything was ironed. I'd learned the basic...

I was late-in a hurry to pick my son up at the Steps-2-Grow Greenhouse/Garden. As I was going around a curve in the road, coming towards me was an Amish man working a field with his team of horses. As he was about to take the curve on his 'road' which would have led him away from me, we shared a wave and a smile-something most of us do as we pass by our Amish neighbors. Then I went looking for my camera. Grabbing hold of it, I pulled my car off the r oad and got out. Running through some weeds and gravel I waved to him again-this time pointing to my camera. Bringing the horses to a stop, he got up from his seat and smiled the biggest smile. "Can I take a picture?" I asked. "No. I do not want my picture taken," he replied walking towards me. "Can I take a picture of your horses?" "Where are you from?"  I told him. Then I asked, "Where's your farm?" He pointed. "The one with all the children!" We both lau...

There was a piano in the front parlor of my grandparents' farmhouse. All of us little ones would take turns sitting on the bench pretending to play except for one cousin who really could play. Sometimes I would sit with her. She'd nod her head when it was time for me to turn the page of her songbook. When she put her fingers on the keys and started to play Rhapsody in Blue I'd be mesmerized straight through to the last note. Over the years, I never did learn how to play the piano but I've always loved listening to someone play. I thought I'd heard it all until coming down a narrow flight of stairs to the main area of a local psychiatric center. I was in a hurry. The monthly meeting had run longer than I'd expected. I was aware of the piano's existence. I'd heard someone playing it awhile back when I was standing-waiting for the elevator to take me to the 2nd floor. But this day was different. There was no hustle or bustle. No one was sitting or sleep...

A SENSE OF HUMOR: All of us have our ways of dealing with life when life doesn't go the way we want it to or when the unexpected comes at us like a hurricane. My father chose humor as his way of dealing. I'm not even sure he knew he did that but looking back, I'm certain that's why he'd do his "Tricky Dick" imitation-and joke with my mother who hardly ever thought he was funny-but we did! My father was a dedicated funeral director. His profession was his passion. The families he served became his families. The care and concern he expressed was genuine. When the phone rang and he was needed, my father was there in an instant. He also loved his hometown. He knew every street-every family and where they lived and who married who and when someone had died right down to the date and where they were buried. It wasn't gossip when he'd go on about a family. It was because he looked upon those families as an extended family of his own. By virtue of b...

    Richard Scarry It can’t be in the water for they were all born in different places. It can’t be one particular year in which they were all born because the year differed. I’m certain it has nothing to do with the fact that June is the month with the longest day of the year or that no other month begins on the same day of the week as June. The common denominator simply is the fact that all these famed creators were all born in the month of June.   Richard Scarry-(pictured above)-author and illustrator of over three hundred books with over one hundred million books sold worldwide, was born in Boston June, 1919. He lived a large part of his adult life in Switzerland which shows in his amazingly creative artwork. His animals and imaginative houses and modes of travel continue to delight children-and the young at heart. Busytown and the Best Ever series were favorites in our house and remain on my book shelf. My kids and I loved searching for Lowly wo...

There's something to say about growing up on a farm. It offers one the opportunity to understand and value the meaning of hard work. My grandparents never stopped from sunup to sundown-using their hands not computers-to do all that had to be done inside and outside their farmhouse-inside and outside the barn and granary-and spreading out to fields just over the plank bridge. I've seen photos of my grandfather coming through the back door into the kitchen looking exhausted yet he was back at it a few hours later. He had to be. There was no slacking. Their livelihood depended on it. Of course he was blessed with a great partner who worked just as hard and just as long. With all the conveniences we have come to depend on-I don't know how my grandmother accomplished so much and got up and did it all over again. But dressed in a house dress, she did it all-even baked and cooked amazing homemade meals every day. During the haying season, she cooked full-fledged dinners that i...

Playing school was a favorite thing to do in our chicken coop clubhouse. But then, we were lucky. Our parents and grandparents filled that old place with desks, books, and chalkboards from an abandoned one-room schoolhouse. Our schoolhouse wasn't made by Fisher-Price. It stemmed from our imagination. There were no summers or week-ends off. Our school was open all year long despite the fact some of the windows were without glass allowing snow to pile up inside during the winter. But we didn't mind. School was in session. And if we didn't have little brothers and sisters and cousins to teach, we used that imagination to fill the two rows of desks-the same type of desks you'd see in 'Little House on the Prairie' episodes. I still have one of my favorite books I used when 'teaching.' It didn't come from that one-room schoolhouse. It belonged to my grandmother. She had a few editions of the "Barnes's New National Readers." The one I have...

Call it what you want-a porch or a veranda. The term doesn't matter as much as the value it holds in the early morning or at the end of a day. It doesn't matter if it's one person sitting there enjoying that first cup of coffee or several sitting around after a long day discussing whatever they choose to discuss. It doesn't matter if it's used for a celebration of a special moment or for the rocking of a little one to sleep as a gentle breeze passes by. Whatever the reason-there is no place like that place called whatever we chose to call it. What does matter are the values of friendship-of family-of conversation and companionship such a place nurtures and develops from one moment to the next. In this era of electronic devices taking over real human interaction where that conversation is turned from people to people face-to-face to cold, hard devices with fingers moving at lightning speed and heads down and where words spoken are nil-that place called whatever...

To this day, there’s absolutely no explanation for my infatuation with classic Ford Mustangs. I know nothing about cars. I never did. But I can tell you when I first took notice of the Mustang, I fell head-over-heels in love-for a car. My parents were always trading cars. Because of their friendship with an Oldsmobile dealer, brands like Cutlass, Toronado, and the Ninety-Eight took turns sitting in our driveway. My father also had a thing for Lincoln Continentals. He was a funeral director so those cars were always black-always spotless and always off limits to those of us just itching to drive something-anything. Once in awhile during the summer he’d come home for lunch in a funeral van sort-of-thing. It too was black. He’d let us take it out beyond the hayfield while he ate. My cousins and I had lots of fun going over the wooden planks that spanned the creek. Then stepping on the pedal, we’d fly up the gravel road and across the open space to the woods. We never told my father ho...

Most of us will live in more than one house as we grow up and move along through our lives. Each will hold its own memories. To me, of all the places I've called home, the house on the lane holds the most endearing memories. It was just a regular neighborhood home-with an upstairs, a closed-in porch where I'd play cards with my imaginary friends and win every time, a flagstone walkway my father and grandfather cemented in place, a cellar where you'd have to enter from the outside, a huge yard with lilac bushes and a rock garden, a kitchen with a counter where my goldfish sat, a front stairway that seemed so steep, a double living room, registers in the floor, and that chimney stack in the parlor that I thought was the most amazing contraption ever. Of course I was little. And when you're little everything seems amazing. The summer before I entered the fourth grade we moved to the country. Still to this day, a part of me remains in that house on the lane. Maybe that...

My mother was a Registered Nurse. Eventually she became the Charge Nurse in the ER on the Night shift. That shift worked well for my parents. My father would be home with my brother and me while my mother worked. Back then nurses wore immaculate, white uniforms-white nylons with a seam up the back and immaculate, white duty shoes. Their caps were white-starched white. My mother's cap had a black ribbon-like material across the front signifying sh e was a registered nurse. Even though I was very young, I sensed the pride she took in her uniform. I remember her nylons hanging on a hanger over the tub after soaking in the sink and her cap just starched spread out flat across the counter. Most of all I remember her polishing her duty shoes with a white liquid shoe polish in a bottle. She'd sit at the kitchen table in her slip with her hair up in bobby pins-shake the stuff-and then proceed to polish the shoes with a foam brush attached to the inside of the cap. She was very car...

A favorite movie is like an old friend. You are always happy to see it again. We all have favorite movies we could watch over and over to the point we are able to say the lines as the actors say them. Great acting is the ability to take a character and turn that character into a real person contributing to a story that flows seamlessly in the eyes of those watching. To the viewer, the actor is not acting. The actor becomes the character. And when that happens, the movie-going experience stays with you for days-for years-after seeing the film. You find yourself wondering about that character. You find yourself replaying parts of the movie in your head as you go about your day. When a movie stays with you long after the experience of watching it, then that to me is a sign of not only great acting but great writing as well. I loved going to see 'Gone With The Wind' with my uncle. I loved the final scene in 'Baby Boom' when the mother returns home and finds her litt...