Today's selection comes from Tara Fox Hall, and it's a true one. Enjoy!
One Christmas morning, when I was a little girl, my father and my uncles and
aunts arrived with the customary presents. As I ran to the door in excitement,
my father told me that Santa and his reindeer had left me something special
outside. I hurried into my coat, boots and mittens, and then we all walked
outside.
my father told me that Santa and his reindeer had left me something special
outside. I hurried into my coat, boots and mittens, and then we all walked
outside.
There, on the flat roof of the garage, was a riding horse on springs. It was the electronic Clip Clop, the first toy of the kind equipped to make real horse noises, and the top toy on my wish list that year.
My father took a ladder off his truck, and helped me carefully climb it to the roof. I peered over the edge, amazed. There in the snow were the tracks of reindeer coming in from one end of the garage roof, and the thin marks from sleigh runners as the reindeer had landed with the sleigh, Santa had offloaded the toy, and then taken off again.
I was enchanted to see that Santa really had left it there for me, but being a child, that lasted for only thirty seconds. My focus shifted quickly to getting Clip Clop down from the roof so I could ride him and hear the whinnying and clopping. With much hoisting by my uncles and my father, that was accomplished. I was soon inside by the tree, riding away in happiness.
It was only when I got older that I understood how much effort my father had taken to get that horse up on the roof. I'm still not sure how he did it, or how he made the sleigh marks and hoof marks without disturbing the snow with any footprints. But I will never forget it.
****
Tara Fox Hall is an OSHA-certified safety and health inspector at a metal fabrication shop in upstate New York. She received her bachelor’s degree in mathematics with a double minor in chemistry and biology from Binghamton University. Her writing credits include nonfiction short stories, flash, short and novella-length horror stories, and contemporary and historical paranormal romance. She also coauthored the essay “The Allure of the Serial Killer,” published in Serial Killers - Philosophy for Everyone: Being and Killing (Wiley-Blackwell, 2010). Her first E-Book, Surrender to Me, was published in September 2011. She divides her free time unequally between writing novels and short stories, chainsawing firewood, caring for stray animals, sewing cat and dog beds for donation to animal shelters, and target practice.
Website: www.tarafoxhall.com
What an enchanting post!
ReplyDeleteAwww, that's such a sweet story. So clever of your father to set things up like that, and to leave you with such a special memory.
ReplyDeleteThanks - it remains the most profound Christmas memory of my youth :) Happy Holidays to you both!
ReplyDelete