Christmas Eve up at the Cabin

“Patience is not the ability to wait, but how you act while you're waiting."

Joyce Meyer

Aunt Janice and Uncle Gordon lived up at their log cabin for many years. Nestled in the forest above Lake Tahoe, the cabin was heaven on earth to me, and I was lucky to spend a good part of every summer and all of Christmas and Easter break there with my family.

The cabin was often covered in snow. We skied, skated, built snow forts, and best of all, had lots of snowball fights. And it was just as much fun inside, running down the halls, playing games, listening to Dean Martin and Nat King Cole while wrapping presents. We cut down our own Christmas trees and decorated them with hand-strung garlands of popcorn and cranberries. You can get a lot done with eight kids helping! The sight and smell of the roaring fire completed the wonderful, joyous atmosphere.

My cousin Stephen and I shared a bedroom down the hall from the living room, where the tree and all the presents were. One Christmas Eve, when we were about nine or ten, we were so excited for the next morning that we could hardly sleep. We kept peeking down the hall after the grownups went to bed, hoping to sneak one last look at the presents before we turned out the light.

The lights in the living room were still on, and we could see the back of Aunt Janice’s head as she sat in one of the red leather chairs facing the fireplace. So, we tried to sleep. But each time we peeked out, there she was.

Finally, we were so wide awake, we figured we would just wait her out and play Monopoly. Now, you know Monopoly takes forever to play, but we were determined to see those presents! And every hour or so, we would look down the hall and see that she was there. Man, what does it take?

We kept playing and looking. We even started down the hall a few times, but always chickened out and crept back to our room. We thought, "She must be onto us!"

Around 7 am, we just gave up and got in bed, closing our weary eyes for what seemed like mere moments. Suddenly, everyone was awake and heading down the hall. As we rushed along, we couldn’t believe that Aunt Janice was?still?sitting there, guarding the presents. But then, she walked in from the kitchen with Uncle Gordon!?What?

As it turned out, what we thought was Aunt Janice was actually a life-sized doll for one of our sisters, sitting on a box. We about fainted…beaten by a doll! We kept that story to ourselves for quite a few years. And yes, we did sleep really well that Christmas night, up at the cabin.

“Christmas Eve up at the Cabin,” from The Saturday Morning Post at hankfrazee.com. Text “Saturday” to 22828 to subscribe.

Photo by Janice M. MacLean