211204 Sentinel, Christmas Songs

Christmas time is when we think back about our lives.

There are lots of thngs that come to mind in this time of reflection.

This morning I am sitting here listening to an old playlist that I made two and a half decades ago. So long ago it was first put on a cassette tape that I played in my truck cassette player as I drove to and from work during the Christmas season. I played that so often I finally wore the player out and it quit with the tape still inside it.

The list brings back a lot of memories. My little truck was so light I had to fill the bed with firewood to have any traction at all.

One time in early December I had yet to fill the truck bed with firewood because the weather had been mild to that point. There was no inkling of bad weather that morning when I went to work, but by the end of the day when I walked out of the building to drive home there were several inches of snow on the highway. I knew I was in trouble. I knew that I could do okay on the flat and level parts of the road, but I dreaded one section where the highway dropped off heading down to a stream called Clear Creek. Going down was no problem and I went over the bridge just fine, but going back up a big hill on the other side was where I would have some trouble. The truck started slipping around every time I had to step down on the gas pedal. I kept feathering the pedal and barely made it to the top of the hill and I breathed a sigh of relief as I reached the pinnacle of that hill. I thought I had clear sailing from the point on to our home.

No sooner had I thought that, when my truck went into a 360 degree spin and went nose down into a deep shoulder on the side of the road head first. There was no way for me to get out of that shoulder. I opened the door and climbed up to the highway. A moment later a nice lady stopped when she saw me and gave me a ride into Ash Grove to a service station that had a tow truck. I was concerned that if I didn’t get that truck towed out of the ditch Joyce would be driving home from her job in Springfield and see that truck and worry if I was unconscious in the truck. She would stop and then be in danger herself. The tow truck driver got my truck out and I was home before Joyce arrived home. I knew who that lady was so the next day I stopped at a floral shop and bought her a big bouquet of flowers and stopped at her home to deliver them. She was home, but it was this giant hulk of a man who answered the door and I could tell by his eyes and looks he was very curious as to why some stranger was bringing flowers to his wife. She came up behind him and possibly saved me a second time when she explained to her husband why this was happening.

Speaking of tow trucks, another time in the morning, I was going to work late that day and followed Joyce who was driving our car. She got as far as the first highway off our farm road and when she stepped on the brakes for a stop sign, the car slid right through the stop, across the highway and right into a ditch on the other side. I drove both of us back to the house and called the same tow truck driver. He came out and pulled her car out of the ditch and towed it up just past the stop sign on our farm road. The farm road had a good-sized dip in it about 35 yards away. I told Joyce to put the car in second gear going down into the dip and do not step on the brakes. I was right behind her and sure enough she stepped on the brakes on the way into the dip. The car lost traction and she was in another ditch. This was the car the next day after it was towed back to the farm.

I picked her up, took her home and called the tow truck driver again. He came out, smiled a good natured grin and suggested he just pick up the car and tow it the rest of the way home. He did and he wouldn’t even take another fee for his work. We both decided to take the rest of the day off. Once Joyce got over her displeasure at sliding into two ditches just 100 yards apart, we had a nice winter’s day together.

Joyce’s mother once said, “Make some memories when you are young because you are going to need them when you get old.” I did not realize how correct she was when she said that, but I understand it now. The picture is Joyce's mother on Christmas of 2000.