High Plains Hearts

by Janet Spaeth

  “I can’t understand why you don’t weigh four hundred pounds,” she grumbled as she investigated the contents of the box. “Ooh, look at this! And this! I don’t know what it is, but it’s chocolate, so it has my attention.”

  “They’re cookies and fudge,” he said. “We’re offering ready-made tins filled with them for people who need quick Christmas gifts. The thermos is filled with hot chocolate, and here’s a bag of marshmallows and a can of whipped cream,” he added as he reached in his pocket, pulled them out, and laid them on the console of the car.

  “Chocolate to eat, chocolate to drink. And Christmas lights to look at. Life is good, very good,” she commented happily.

  As they left, Jake drove around to the front of Panda’s so she could see how it looked with all the trees lit up.

  It was an amazing sight. The rich tones he had chosen were strikingly beautiful. She could see why the hues he had chosen reminded him of the three Wise Men and their camels. The jeweled hues were majestic.

  The Pines was aglow with Christmas lights. Jake pointed to one house on the first block they visited. Full-size snowmen made out of wire and colored bulbs guarded the front yard. On the roof a Santa and sleigh were parked—not the usual plywood cutout, but a real sleigh and a mannequin to portray Santa.

  He pulled over to the side so she could see it better. “Look,” she said, pointing to Santa, “he seems so real.” She nearly passed out from shock when Santa got out of his sleigh and waved at them.

  Jake laughed. “That’s Mike Summers up there. He does this every evening between six and seven. Great fun, isn’t it?”

  One yard had an elaborate nativity scene with animated animals. “Mary and Joseph look chilly out there in the snow with only their robes on,” Tess said.

  Jake agreed. “Makes you want to throw some coats on them, doesn’t it?”

  In a neighboring yard the owners had used the snow to sculpt a three-dimensional scene of Bethlehem in white that extended the length of their property. It was backlit with a soft blue light. Over one section a bright golden light shone, signifying the star that led the shepherds to the stable.

  Another house was wrapped entirely in lights, like a gigantic present.

  Tess quickly picked her favorites. The Bethlehem scene showed great creativity, she said, and Jake nodded. “The owner is a doctor with no creative ability at all except in healing, but he’s very religious. He hired some college students to do it.”

  Knowing that took nothing away from her enjoyment of it.

  As they drove through the area, large white flakes began to fall.

  “Look at that. It’s truly the Christmas season,” she said as she cradled her hands around the warm mug of hot chocolate.

  “I can’t imagine living someplace where it was warm at Christmas,” he said. “As much as I complain about the snow, this is one time when I want to see it.”

  “Isn’t it interesting that we do depend upon it to bring us to the season?” she asked. “Like for us, anyway, there are cues. Would it be Christmas without the snow and the lights and the trees?”

  “Yes,” he said reflectively, “it would be, but would we truly feel it? I hear people all the time saying they don’t have the Christmas spirit or they’re not in the mood right now for Christmas.”

  “I wonder about that because it’s true. I know I’ve felt it myself. Why do we need these cues? I’ve even heard children say it, so it’s not because we’re jaded or shopworn.”

  “Could it be that this is not a solitary holiday, that we need to share it with others? There’s such a universal joy surrounding this time of year. Maybe that’s it. We pick up on other people’s droopiness.” He shrugged. “I never really thought about it, but you’re right. It is an intriguing phenomenon.”

  “I’ve been giving Reverend Barnes’s sermon this morning some thought. Remember how he asked us to focus on what we want?”

  “Yes.”

  “I’m glad he did.”

  “And what have you decided?” he asked, his head cocked as he listened carefully.

  “I don’t know yet. But it is a challenge. It’s like shopping in the world’s biggest candy store. What do I want? About the only thing I’m sure of is that I know I want more than a racing car.” They both laughed at the memory of the little boy who had amused the congregation that morning.

  “There is so much I want. The usual good things like health and happiness for my family and friends,” he said, “but I think Reverend Barnes means more than that. What do we want for ourselves?”

  “It’s a hard thing to know and even harder to put into words. But I think that’s part of what he was getting at,” she mused thoughtfully, watching the Christmas lights as he continued to drive slowly.

  “The minister who taught our confirmation class many years ago said our prayers are a good way of finding out what’s truly important to us. What matters enough to pray about? And do we care enough to take whatever action we can?” Jake slowed down to avoid a cat that dashed across the road.

  “Can you explain?”

  “Well, he gave the example of someone who is in a nursing home. We may care enough to pray about that person, but do we care enough to leave the comfort of our homes and visit him? And then he also said we should ask how God must feel about our priorities. A good exercise might be to compare ours to His.”

  “It’s a wonderful concept,” she said softly. “I’ll have to keep that in mind as I work through my wish list this week.”

  “Unfortunately,” he continued, as they left the Pines and traveled back toward the rest of the End, “this doesn’t do much good when my most fervent prayer is something like, ‘Oh God, please let this roaster work,’ or, ‘If You let my car start, I will love You forever.’ Selfish little things like that. I wonder sometimes if God gets a bit annoyed with me.”

  She chuckled. “Well, God is probably annoyed with 99 percent of the population then. I do that all the time, pray dumb things like that. Sometimes I catch myself trying to make deals with God: ‘God, if You’ll let the pilot light on the furnace ignite on the first match, I’ll pray more each day.’ ”

  “Does it work?” Jake asked, tilting his head and smiling.

  “Of course not! Actually, my grandparents trained me well enough that I almost always catch myself in the act of praying that way, so I’m not too bad in that realm. I have more problems with the flat-out, spur-of-the-moment demands on God’s powers: ‘Let this person buy this angel because then I can pay the utility bill.’ Or worse, ‘Please let these pants fit.’ ”

  “I can’t imagine you doing that,” he said, reaching across the car and patting her hand. “First of all, you’re much too pious—”

  “Pious!”

  He had the grace to look embarrassed. “Well, what word would you use?”

  “Not pious. Faithful, maybe. Devoted. True. Loyal. Trusting.”

  “That’s better? That list makes you sound like a cocker spaniel.”

  She laughed. “Maybe we should all be like cocker spaniels. I’m a cat person, but I have to admit that cocker spaniels are the epitome of loving adoration mixed with exuberance.”

  “Good way to phrase it.”

  “Maybe they’re good spiritual models for us. And maybe even earthly models.”

  “I guess the greatest danger would be that people would feel compelled to pat your head and give you nice meaty bones to chew on.”

  “And make you eat snacks like Giblet Niblets. There is undoubtedly something similar for dogs that is just as stinky as that stuff.” She shuddered again at the memory of the fetid treats.

  “I had a black Lab when I was a kid, and I can tell you from past experience, dogs will eat anything. I won’t go into details. Just be a good dog and trust me.”

  “Or I could be a good cat and ignore you,” she teased in return.

  They entered a section of the End where small houses sat next to each other, no two exactly alike but not entirely different, lik
e brothers and sisters.

  Each house was decorated with what was apparently an obligatory string of lights along the lower edge of the roof. In the yards were illuminated plastic snowmen or Santa Clauses.

  “This is low-income housing,” he told her. “The End’s Community and Business Organization, CBO, discovered that the people who live here really wanted to decorate their houses but couldn’t afford it. So we gathered together donations and bought Christmas lights for anyone who wanted them. The only hitch was they had to put them up themselves.”

  He stole a glance at her. “What was truly heartwarming about this story is every single house accepted them, and every single house put them up. We heard that in houses where elderly people lived, their neighbors volunteered to put the lights up.”

  “This is truly a neighborhood where the Christmas spirit abounds,” she whispered, seeing new meaning in the gleaming colors that stretched ahead as far as she could see like an endless rope of light, all at roof level, and all indicating a unified neighborhood celebrating the extraordinary joy of this holiday season.

  She stared out the window of the car, drinking in the view as if it were water for a hungry soul.

  “Stop!” she cried.

  Jake slammed on the brakes, and the car fishtailed on the frost-slicked road before coming to a stop.

  “Sorry,” she said. “Didn’t mean to startle you. But look!”

  She pointed to a figure in the yard. It was a snowman, obviously fashioned by children, and around its neck hung a hand-lettered sign.

  She had to struggle to make out the letters through the thickly falling snow. “Jake, look at that,” she said in delight as she figured it out. “It’s a birth announcement. Listen!”

  Jake leaned forward as she read the words aloud: “ ‘Born December 25. Name: Jesus. Parents: Mary, Joseph, and God. Weight: Our endless sin and His forgiveness. Length: Eternity. Welcome, Jesus!’ ”

  Her throat closed up as she fought back tears. Whoever had written this had captured the true sentiment of the season perfectly.

  She had heard the downtowners referring with scorn to the End and particularly to this part of town, the assisted housing. She’d always imagined it to be like the housing projects she’d seen on the news, ill-kept and overrun with who-knew-what. She’d never expected to see the pride and care evidenced by the vista she now beheld.

  “You seem taken by this all.” His voice revealed his surprise.

  “I’ve never been out here before,” she confessed, “and what I’m seeing is totally at odds with what I’d envisioned it would be like.”

  “It’s nice, isn’t it?”

  “Very nice. As a matter of fact, I wish many places downtown were maintained as well as this neighborhood.”

  He drove to another section of the End. Here middle-class families had bedecked their homes with several strands of lights, and the yard scenes were larger. Wreaths hung from every house, and many sported electric candles shining from curtained windows.

  Then the houses became much larger and the decorations more ostentatious. On many houses were rooftop displays, although none of these Santas stepped out of the sleigh to wave.

  Some arrays were downright garish.

  Tess blinked as one house came into view. The owners had obviously decided to spare no expense, and their electric bill would surely show it.

  The house was entirely wrapped in lights. Animated elves climbed up and down the walls, bringing toys to Santa’s workshop, which was stationed on the housetop. A relay system must have run down the back of the house because the elves worked in an endless loop, bringing dolls and baseball bats up the wall and climbing back down for another load.

  The yard itself had been turned into a candy-cane garden. Nearly fifty candy canes, seven feet tall, sprouted through the snow, and Tess and Jake watched as children played tag through the maze.

  Over it all a loudspeaker played “Jingle Bells” continuously, as gigantic cutout silvery jingle bells swung back and forth over the garage doors, not quite in time to the music.

  “That’s, well, that’s—” Tess was at a loss for words. All she could do was stare at the display.

  “Bizarre?” Jake suggested.

  “At least. What do you suppose their neighbors think of it? It would drive me absolutely bonkers in one night. By Christmas I’d be a basket case.”

  “Well, his closest neighbor is the president of the electric company.”

  “Ohh.” She nodded understandingly. “I see. And so does he, I suppose. I bet every time he looks out his window he sees a bonus in his future.”

  “And the person who lives in this house is also a business owner.” Jake named the largest electric equipment supply company in the northern region. “So you can probably write this scene off as part wild Christmas spirit and part economic grandstanding.”

  “I’ve certainly done my share of goofy decorating blunders, but that place is downright tacky. I can’t imagine living there.”

  “Hey!” Jake protested laughingly. “This is prime real estate.”

  “It’s definitely prime something. All I know is after seeing that I need chocolate. I need some fudge, and I need it quick!”

  “Chocolate will make you like that house better?” he asked her.

  “No, but I do like fudge. Almost anything is bearable if you’re eating fudge.”

  “Oh.” He nodded in mock seriousness. “That explains chocolate’s mass appeal.”

  They drove farther down the street where the houses sprawled a bit more and the decorations became as expansive as the property allowed. These houses had grounds, not yards.

  One house was technically perfect. The pristine white front of the three-story Edwardian was lit with soft cream lights. Evergreen ropes wrapped around the columns in precise twists. The polished brass fixings of the entrance reflected the light and offset the deep green wreath that was easily five feet across. Tess tried to determine if the musical instruments tied to the wreath were real. They certainly looked that way.

  There were no garish lights here, no animated displays of the North Pole. It looked like a picture from a Christmas card, especially with the snow continuing to fall, light and fluffy, but it felt hollow and icy. This house seemed to be on the other end of the spectrum from the electrical extravaganza down the street.

  And both were, in their opposing ways, pretentious.

  “That’s about the extent of the Christmas-lights tour of the End,” Jake announced as he pulled away from the final house. “So what did you think? Of course it’ll all be beefed up in a week or so. Lots of folks went out of town this weekend for Thanksgiving.”

  “You know what my favorite was?”

  “The Electric Elves visit Candy Cane County?” he guessed.

  “Wrong-o. Although that one will live in my memory forever,” she said dryly, “kind of like those Giblet Niblets.”

  They grimaced in unison.

  “And to think they both happened on the same night. That’s a bit too much coincidence for me,” he said, shaking his head. “I’m not a superstitious guy—don’t believe in it—but let’s hope these things don’t come in threes. So which of these holiday houses was your favorite, although I think I already know?”

  “My favorite was the section with only the string of lights and the handmade decorations. Especially the snowman holding the birth announcement.”

  He nodded. “I hadn’t seen that before, but it’s wonderful.”

  “I’m going to call Reverend Barnes tomorrow and tell him to go take a look at it.” She glanced sideways at him, chagrined. “But I don’t know where the house was. Can you write down the directions for me?”

  “I’ll go you one better,” he promised. “I’ll call him and tell him. And if he wants, I’ll drive him over there to see it.”

  “You’re a nice guy, Jake.” And he truly was. Over and over he was showing her his compassion for others, a kind streak that ran a mile wide and a mile deep.
<
br />   “Do nice guys finish last?” His eyes were twinkling like the lights they’d seen.

  “Not at my table. And speaking of finishing last and eating, let’s go to Stravinski’s.”

  “But we haven’t seen the downtown lights,” Jake protested.

  She was grateful for the darkened interior of the car so he couldn’t see the betraying flush that was creeping up her neck and washing over her cheeks. She could feel the heat from it.

  “I’m hungry, okay?” It came out more defensively than she’d intended.

  He saluted. “Yes, ma’am!”

  She softened her approach. “There’s one thing you’ll learn about me, or maybe you already have. I think it’s probably hereditary, a defect I was born with.”

  He glanced over at her with concern. “What is it, honey?”

  “Where some people have a stomach, I have a bottomless pit.”

  “You scamp! You had me worried there!” he threw back at her, but she could tell he wasn’t angry. The edges of his eyes turned up with amusement. “I thought it was something serious.”

  “It is when I’m hungry. Then everybody had better watch their step!”

  “Luckily for me I own a restaurant,” he muttered playfully. “It’s closer than Stravinski’s. Should we go there instead?”

  She shook her head emphatically. “While I loved Panda’s, my stomach is all set for Stravinski’s Caesar salad and white northern soup.”

  “And I wondered where Cora got her appetite.” He winked at her. “Are you two related?”

  “Close. By a whisker.”

  He groaned. “That was bad, Tess. You had me feline real, real awful.”

  She smiled impishly. “Ah, just drive, Mr. Cameron. No more puns. I want the rest of this evening to be absolutely, totally purrfect.”

  Chapter 10

  An hour later Tess wiped her mouth with her napkin and sighed in satisfaction. “I am stuffed.”

  The server walked over, balancing a tray with one hand. He lowered it enticingly near Tess’s face, close enough that she could see and smell the mouthwatering aromas of the elaborate desserts.