The Rural Voice, 1977-12, Page 29spend the rest of the time trying to urge their seniors on. The
adults pretended to eat as slowly as possible and speak loudly of
having second or even third helpings of the pudding though they
were actually wondering if they could manage to find room for
even their first portion. Eventually though the meal was finished
and the leftover food cleared away. The dishes were left until
after the presents were opened.
Like everyone's tree ours was heaped with presents. They
were handed out and opened, the excitement of the youngsters
being so great that the air was filled with bows and bits of
wrapping paper flung by flying little hands. Soon the Iivingroom
floor would be knee-deep in the remnants of the once -beautiful
packages.
Once the mess was cleaned up and the dishes washed, tray
upon tray of homemade candies were brought out and somehov.
despite the feeling one was going to burst only an hour before.
everyone found room to nibble on some fudge or shortbread or
home-made chocolates.
In my early years my grandmother lived with us and that
almost always meant a new deck of cards would be among the
presents and the afternoon would be occupied by card playing
among the adults (or a game of scrabble on the year she received
that for Christmas). There was a beautiful feeling of time and
place as the long Christmas afternoon trailed toward dusk.
Nothing else in the world mattered: not the bullies at school, not
the bills that had to be paid, not the weather outside whether it
was sunny or stormy; nothing, but these people and this
once -a -year day.
Supper was a liesurely event, a sandwich of left -over turkey
here, a little salad there, but not too much of anything since
nearly all stomachs were full. After supper the men went out to
the barn to do the chores, the women cleaned up the dishes and
the kids played half-heartedly with the toys before bedtime. The
air was filled with a feeling of melancholy. It couldn't be over
already, this day that had been waited for, dreamed of for so
long. It couldn't be a whole year before it would come again.
It wasn't . I think, the thought of the presents alone that made
us wish tomorrow could be Christmas all over again, but the
feeling that we wanted this closeness, this love, this feeling of
magic to last even just one more day before the hard world of
reality came flooding back in again. We couldn't stop the clock
though, and perhaps it is because these feeling are such fleeting
commodities, commodities that come so infrequently that
Christmas remains such a precious time of the year, a day we
think about for the other 364 days. 0
PG.28. THE RURAL VOICE/DECEMBER1977.
f
EVERYONE NEEDS TREES
htirjiL
441A}
TO BUILD TO LEARN
ph$
TO ENJOY TO LIVE !
TREES... A GROWING CONCERN