Photo by Anne Nygård on Unsplash
Friday, December 23rd—In the spirit of the holidays, our outdoor cat, Tawny, left a present at the backdoor. While I’m not certain what the present was when it was alive, I do know that the remains were now solidly frozen to the doormat and to the nearby concrete slab. The current temperature here in Far East Memphis is two with a wind chill of minus 17.
Happy Holidays, I mumbled to myself as I attached a leash to Zoe, our eight-year-old border collie, who’s eager to get outside, no matter the conditions, to relieve herself. We pushed past Tawny, proudly sitting at attention next to her gift, and surveyed our surroundings. The backyard, freshly devoid of leaves raked up earlier in the week, was a frozen tundra. Zoe, impatient and a little more desperate, yanked me across the slick carport. I felt a little like Santa, being propelled across the night sky by his reindeer.
I’m no Santa, however, and Zoe’s no Rudolph. We zigged and zagged, and slid across the snowy concrete—the four-legged child on a mission to find the nearest spot of terra firma not covered in a layer of ice. I shuffled onto the driveway, which was an icy mix of, well, ice and snow and whatever else fell from the sky during last night’s blizzard. Scary, gusty winds had rocked our house. I’m surprised we didn’t lose any large oak limbs.
Zoe found a dash of green among the ice-encrusted fescue. After she finished, I’m reminded of that old Frank Zappa song, Don’t Eat the Yellow Snow. Why am I thinking about Frank Zappa at the 6:35 in the morning? Probably because my brain, like the rest of my body, was succumbing to the deadly cold temperatures.
Minus 17 wind chill. Unbelievable.
***
Sunday, December 18th—For the Billett Family, the holidays began when our son’s flight from Atlanta touched ground at Memphis International. Zach, who didn’t make it home for Thanksgiving, would spend the entire week with us. My wife, Vicki, and I looked forward to having our foursome—our daughter, Emily, currently lives with us—under one roof for Christmas.
Sadly, my eighty-six-year-old father passed away that same afternoon. His health had rapidly deteriorated in recent days, so the news was not entirely a shock…but it was still a shock. Vicki and I had last seen Grandpa in late October at the nursing home in North Tampa. He suffered through the latter stages of Alzheimer’s and was confined to a wheelchair. Even so, Dad continued taking meals in the home’s dining room, feeding himself and carrying on somewhat coherent conversations. After a while, he’d digress into strange rambling monologues, which contained only bits and pieces of reality.
Yet, I miss hearing his voice.
His death meant that this Christmas would be an emotional one. In fact, all Christmases going forward will be emotional.
***
Back inside on that frigid Friday morning, while the coffee brewed, I fed Zoe and straightened up the kitchen table. Vicki was in the shower, while Emily and Zach slept. Once Zoe finished, I braced myself for the cold and headed back outside to deal with the cat and her gift. I filled Tawny’s bowl with dry food and checked her water bowl. Frozen. Solid. Of course, it is, dummy. Water freezes at 32 degrees. Right then, it was well below freezing. Tawny’s water resembled an oversized ice cube, and her metal bowl was securely attached to the frozen slab.
Happy Holidays, I reminded myself.
Next, I attempted to deal with Tawny’s gift. First, I tried to move the doormat, which wouldn’t budge. Frozen to the concrete slab. Of course, it was. Next, I tried to pry the mat loose with an iron firewood poker from the fire pit. Eventually, the doormat broke free and, in the spirit of the holidays, I slung it across the back patio. Ho, ho, ho, I grumbled. The rest of the frozen remains, equally affixed to the carport slab, were quickly covered with an old towel, held down by a pair of my Crocs, covered in snow.
Not the kind of holiday image you’d see on the Hallmark Channel.
***
Thursday, December 22nd—As Christmas week moved along, I walked a tightrope of emotions, balancing the sadness over my father’s death with the contentment I felt that our family was together, again, even if only for a week. My kids may never fully understand how having them around helped me maintain my equilibrium.
Watching Emily and Zach play board games, or talk about their favorite sci-fi authors, reminded me that being a dad is the best feeling in the world. Like me, Grandpa was proud of these two and loved them very much.
The first few days after my dad’s death were rough, extremely rough. Sadness came and went, intensified, early on, by helping out Kim, my younger sister, handle arrangements with a local funeral home in Tampa, Florida, our hometown.
By Thursday, a tiny bit of Christmas spirit squeezed through my emotional malaise. Oddly enough, this happened while waiting outside the Germantown Huey’s for a lunchtime table. I watched other patrons, also waiting, chat and laugh, and greet their friends and neighbors, who came and went while our Mid-South weather grew decidedly colder and rainier.
At that moment, it finally felt like Christmas.
***
Late Friday morning, what would be the first of several power outages darkened our home. Vicki, now safely at work after a slippery drive into Germantown, texted me to say that Shelby County was under rolling blackouts. Rolling blackouts, for the uninitiated, are when a utility company temporarily cuts power to one or more areas to prevent the entire electrical grid from failing.
Apparently, there was miscommunication about these planned outages between MLGW, our utility company, and the regional energy provider, TVA. Combine the fast-moving winter storm and the severe cold with a growing strain on the power grid—all over a holiday weekend—and both MLGW and local media were caught flat-footed.
As Professor Hinkle, the bumbling bad guy in Frosty the Snowman, might say, “Messy, messy, messy.”
Power outages during the long Christmas weekend would be annoying, to say the least, but we were together and safe. We’d make the best of this situation. Besides, we had dry firewood, plenty of blankets, and, of course, running water.
Christmas would be fine. A bit cold with a heavy dose of melancholy, but, overall, we’d be fine.
***
Saturday, December 24—Christmas Eve day started with silence and frustration. Our power went out sometime around 5:30 am and stayed off for more than an hour and a half. Not the thirty-minute blackouts promised by MLGW and TVA, and not the scheduled time posted on MLGW’s webpage.
Ho, ho, ho.
More Christmas mischief? Or, more miscommunication—or, lack of communication—during a holiday weekend?
My vote was miscommunication. Unfortunately, more frustrations soon followed.
Eventually, the power came on, the coffee brewed, and the furry children were fed their breakfast. The grown children, sleeping in, would eat a little later.
Early Christmas Eve brought another holiday surprise. MLGW had just issued a boil water advisory for their customers, which included our Memphis neighborhood, which borders Germantown.
How did we find out? A political reporter for The Daily Memphian, whom Emily follows on Twitter, re-tweeted the MLGW advisory. Emily just happened to be scrolling through Twitter when she saw his tweet.
Messy, messy, messy.
My emotional tightrope sagged as that fleeting touch of Christmas spirit faded, much like our home’s water pressure.
***
Sunday, December 25—For me, Christmas Day brought renewed optimism with a pinch of internal peace, in spite of MLGW’s role of Scrooge. I’ve always loved Christmas morning and often get up early to simply gaze at our Christmas tree with gifts underneath.
Christmas Day without drinkable tap water proved a unique challenge, but through creativity and resourcefulness, we managed to have most of our traditional Christmas meal: homemade cranberry sauce, prepared before MLGW’s water advisory, along with a pre-cooked ham, and Rhodes brand dinner rolls—called Texas Rolls due to their large size—only found at the SuperLo on Spottswood.
Vicki’s sweet potato casserole and my special homemade mashed potatoes would have to wait until New Years Day. Both were replaced with Trader Joe’s hash brown patties, originally slated for Christmas morning breakfast.
Much like Santa employing Rudolph’s special nose to guide his sleigh through that terrible winter storm, we improvised in order to celebrate Christmas as we always do. While seated around the dining room table—covered with a pressed white table cloth—the importance of traditions, of family, of healing from loss, and of the future hit me all at once.
As my family ate and talked, I watched the lights on our tree sparkle. For obvious reasons, Christmas 2022 would always be etched in my soul. I wondered if somewhere out there, among the twinkling stars, Grandpa was at peace. I’m no longer much of a spiritual man, but I know that even in death, the spirit of Christmas remains very much alive.
Still, I would have loved to have heard his voice just one last time.