Christmas Eve

This is a letter that Dad sent to my cousin Michael who was born on Christmas Eve. I’m not sure of the date which is was sent, but if I find out I’ll add it here.

This is me.

Dear Michael,

As we were looking for a birthday card for you, I saw this one with the biplanes, and it took me back to a time long ago – to a good time and a bad time all in one. Perhaps your mother has told you of my years as a fighter pilot in the Great War. Now they call it World War One. But those of us who were there simply called it the War Against the Kaiser. Our airplanes were made of wood and cloth back then – a wooden frame covered with cloth which was varnished many times to make it strong and firm against the wind and weather. Some planes had but one wing, and were called monoplanes. Most had two wings, as on this card, and were called biplanes. Some, flown by our enemy, the Germans, had three wings and were called triplanes. They were fragile, and dangerous, and fun to fly. We were the fearless men in their flying machines. I was what we called an “Ace,” which means that I shot down many enemy planes. The number I will not tell, for it is not proper to brag or boast of such things.

One night, I was sent out on routine patrol, to watch for enemy troop movements, or such things as that. It was a moonlit night. It was a special night. It was a Christmas Eve night. As I flew my solitary patrol, all was calm, all was bright. It was nearly time for my return to base, as my fuel supply was getting low. It was then that I saw it. A chill went through me. There it was. That triplane that our adversary flew. But not just any triplane, for I had fought many of them over the years. This one bore the insignia of Baron Manfred von Richthofen. The Red Baron. The “Ace of Aces.” The Red Baron had shot down more planes than anyone. My little biplane was the equal of his triplane, but the Red Baron was the better pilot. We engaged in battle. We dived and climbed. We twisted and turned. The tracer rounds and the muzzle flash from our machine guns turned brilliant the night. But I was low on fuel, and this caused me to make a mistake. I took my eyes off the Red Baron long enough to glance at my fuel gauge. This was all the advantage that the Red Baron needed. Suddenly, I felt my dauntless little biplane shudder and shake. The bullets from his guns tore into the wooden frame and the motor of my little plane. I frantically worked the throttle to keep the engine running. I quickly searched for a place to land, just to find only hills and forest below. But I knew that it was over for me. I knew that the Red Baron would come back, his guns blazing, to finish off my crippled little plane. There he was, diving out of a low cloud right at me. But then an amazing thing happened. Instead of shooting me out of the night sky, he pulled his plane along side of mine, and pointed towards the ground. I looked in that direction, and there among the hills and woods was a small, level field – just big enough to land my plane. With smoke trailing behind me, I turned towards the field. Just as my engine coughed and died, I felt my wheels hit the frozen ground. My biplane bounced and landed and bounced and landed several times on the rough field before coming to a stop just a few feet from the fence row. The Red Baron circled the field a couple of times, and then he surprised me again. He, too, bounced his plane across the frozen field and came to a stop next to me. As he started to climb out of his plane, he reached down into the cockpit – I thought for a gun, to take me prisoner. But no, it was a thermos and two tin cups that he held in his hand. We shared a Holiday toast of the best hot chocolate that I have ever tasted. We shook hands and saluted, and we prayed for peace right there on that frozen field. The Red Baron then returned to his plane. His engine roared and he took off into the night. He flew back low over me, and I heard him exclaim ere he flew out of sight, “Happy Christmas to All, and to All a Good Night!”

A few months later, I heard shouts of celebration all around the air base. The road for the Red Baron had ended. One of our pilots had sent his triplane spinning and burning to the ground. I did not celebrate. I remembered that silent night, that holy night, when two men prayed for peace in a small frozen field in the middle of nowhere. What did I hear you ask? Is my story true? Well, let me say this, if it isn’t, it should be.

Christmas Eve is a special day. Every bit as special as Christmas itself. You are fortunate to have been born on such a special day as this. Happy Birthday, my fine young man.

Much Love,

Uncle Carl

A Story of Christmas Past

Sent: Thursday, December 19, 2002

We moved in to this old house in May of ‘75, and in mid-December, on a Saturday evening, Annie commenced to set up and decorate the Christmas Tree, for she was hosting a Kids Christmas Party for the family on Sunday morning. That very afternoon, we had tramped far and wide over Ely’s Tree Farm at the bottom of the hill until we found the perfect tree. Perfect enough in light of the fact that I finally reasoned with Annie by saying, “WILL YOU JUST PICK ONE ALREADY!!!!” So then I laid down in the snow and took to cutting at the thing with a dull old bow saw that the tree farmer had graciously loaned me in consideration of a two dollar and fifty cent deposit. If you have ever cut in to the trunk of a sappy evergreen with a dull old bow saw, you can appreciate my good humor by the time the job was done. For some reason, Annie always seemed content to pick a cut tree off the lot in years following.

So, we get the tree set all up in an old galvanized bucket filled with rocks and old bricks and tied it to the sill of the picture window so that it wouldn’t fall over. Annie got it to looking rather pretty, covering up the hollow spots so that you would hardly know they were there. But then a great calamity showed up. The “star” for the top of the tree, when unwrapped, was found to be in a rather bad state. It really wasn’t a star as such, but a cone shaped thing with a bulge in the center, with a Santa Claus doing one thing or the other, and it was in a few large pieces with countless shards abounding. And she said, “can you fix it?” Now growing up on a farm, you learn to fix most anything, but I had to admit that this one was beyond my humble abilities. So of course, Annie said, “Let’s go up town and get a new one.”

Now it is useful to remember that this was the year of ‘75, and the sleepy little town of Montrose rolled up the sidewalks at 9:00 P.M. promptly, and the time of the calamity being a bit after nine, it was a lost cause. Annie then suggested that we fly to Binghamton. Now in ‘75, the days of the big malls and of stores staying open late for your shopping convenience were not as yet in evidence. I sadly told her that even if we left right now, and if the stores of the big city were open to the late hour of ten o’clock, they would be closing up just as we got there. In all her wondrous logic, I was informed that you can’t very well have a Christmas Party without a star on the tree, and having so enlightened me, Annie pouted off to bed, leaving me in the kitchen to ponder these things.

So I did what any other man in my situation might do. I went to the frig and grabbed a beer. After several beers worth of contemplating the shattered mess left in my charge, my mind took to wandering back to that Christmas at Fort Hood a few years previous. Someone mentioned that it would be nice to have a Christmas Tree in our barracks. Now we were fortunate in that we had living in our bay a couple of guys who, by the allowance of a liberal judge, had joined the Army in lieu of going directly to jail. In the spirit of the season, they went out and stole a Christmas Tree. After getting it set up, it occurred to us that we had nary a bulb or light to hang on the poor thing. It was then suggested that we could make our own decorations using aluminum foil, but we had as much of that as we did bulbs and lights. So our enterprising patriots volunteered to break in to the mess hall for some foil, which they did. While they were so engaged, they thoughtfully liberated a gallon jar of olives as well.

So, we sat up late that night making all manner of aluminum foil stars, crosses, bulbs, chains, peace signs, and a few FTA’s, all the while feasting on army green olives. Now some of the non-veterans amongst us might wonder, “what the heck is an FTA?” Well, what with women and wee little ones being present, I can’t tell you what it stands for. But I will offer up a censored version, which would be, “Fooey the Army”. Now for some reason, the First Sergeant comes through the barracks that Sunday morning and spots our tree. In the warm and fuzzy way of all First Sergeants, he cites all manner or regulation prohibiting having trees in the barracks, and begs our favor of disposing of the offending tree. Such were the howls of protest that he decided to let the “Old Man” settle the issue. Now the Captain, who I believe was born with a shaved head, for that’s the only way anyone could ever remember having seen him, must have been in a cordial state of mind that morning. He pretended not to see the empty olive jar, which we had neglected to hide, and told us to “get those #%&?! Peace signs and FTA’s off that tree”. With that, he executed a perfect about face, and went off to do whatever it is that Captains and other such high beings might do on a day off.

And therein lay the answer to my conundrum. Aluminum foil and cardboard!!!! So I took a pencil and paper and began to draw a pattern of a typical 5 point star. An hour and a beer later, I decided that it is not within the human condition to draw a symmetrical 5 point star. Now the never ending troubles in the Middle East have confounded bigger minds than mine for many years, but that night it paid a dividend. The cover of my Newsweak magazine pictured the flag of Israel. Why not the Star of David? After all, triangles are easy enough to make, even for a somewhat sotted brain at one o’clock in the morning. An almost empty Cheerios box was pressed into service shortly thereafter, and with tape, foil, and pipe cleaners, it was transformed into a sparkling new star which adorned our Christmas Tree before I tumbled off to bed that cold winters night. Annie gave it a rather dubious look on Sunday morning, but I assured her that we would get a real one on our next trip to town.

As I was attaching the homemade star to the tree for the 26^th time this past December, I said to Annie, “Isn’t it time to retire this old thing? We could get one of those nice Angels that you so admire every year”. Her answer caused me to turn away to fiddle with one thing or another, so as to hide the tear in my eye. Annie said, “That ‘old thing’ is our star, and I don’t want a new one. I asked the boys the same question a few years ago, and they both said that our Christmas Tree just wouldn’t look right without Dad’s homemade star on the top”.

God has given many people many gifts over the many years. Some of God’s gifts are great, and some are small. Some are just bits of cardboard, foil and tape. Merry Christmas, and May God Bless Us, Everyone.