A midweek fiction offering for you. I wrote this to share at this year’s Soil and Water Conservation District Christmas party. I value my family’s ability to live close to the land and honor its many gifts. As you consider your many blessings at the close of the year, lift a prayer of gratitude and support for our farmers and the work they do to keep our country fed.

“All right old man. I guess it’s about that time of year. Go and get me whatever shirts you’ve worn out this summer and the coveralls you know you won’t get much more use of. I can think of at least one I’ve patched the butt and the knee of. There’s another – dark blue maybe? Anyways, I remember seeing the knees were almost worn out of that one too. Oh, and there’s the pair that the mule pulled your pocket and it ripped trying to get to the peppermint you had tucked inside. Bring me at least two of those.” 

Carl looked at his wife, pretending to be put out. “Who are you calling old man?!”

“You, you old man!” Sue Anne laughed. “You can’t really think of yourself as anything but old, considering I’ve got eight grandchildren on top of our three kids I now have to make stockings for before Christmas.”

“Can’t it wait till tomorrow? The game’s about to start and I don’t want to miss it.” Carl pointed at the television set sitting on top of a small hutch Sue Anne’s parents had given them as a wedding present many years ago. Her daddy had made it for their kitchen but now the grandkids kept it filled with their favorite toys.

“You know as well as I do the Braves don’t play for another hour and the talk before the game won’t get good for at least another fifteen minutes. There’s time.” Sue Anne watched as her husband wound himself up to argue but she cut him off. “No! I’m as excited as you that they’re in the semifinals this year but that doesn’t get you out of doing this chore first.”

Carl threw her a mischievous grin. “You’re just excited because you think Chipper Jones has a cute butt.”

“That’s not true! I mean, he does but that’s not why I watch. I may not be an expert at baseball but if I don’t keep up with Glavin and the other pitcher’s, I’ll have no hope of keeping up with the conversation on Sunday. Those church women know the Braves’ pitchers better than they do the twelve tribes of Israel!”

Carl let out a hearty laugh as he shook his head and walked toward the bedroom. On the left side of his closet he found the shirts he started to squirrel away when he knew they would not last much longer. He would take off his shirt at the end of the day then look it over. If he knew he had worn it for the last time, he made a mental note then watched for the next laundry day. Sue Anne would hand him the newly pressed shirt to hang up with his others, but instead he would tuck it out of the way on the left side of the closet, thinking about how his wife might use it the next Christmas.

The coveralls were a different matter. Sometimes Sue Anne “retired” those long before Carl would have liked. On more than a few mornings, Carl would start to look for a favorite pair of coveralls only to find them nowhere in sight. Inevitably he would ask his wife if she’d seen them. She would start fussing about how worn out they were and no good to him anymore, so she had put it in her Christmas box for the fall. Every argument ended in giggles and stolen kisses for the rest of the day.

Carl returned to the living room, old clothes over one arm and a glass of tea in each hand. He handed one glass to his wife, followed by the worn out shirts and coveralls, leaning over to kiss her on the forehead. She lifted a hand to his cheek before he stepped aside to settle in his recliner. He turned the volume up on the television and she turned her face down to the pile of clothes now in her lap.

Early October marked both the end of the growing season and the start of Sue Anne’s sewing season. Some pumpkins remained on the vine and other ornamental squash for the grandchildren to use come Halloween. But for the most part, the field work was done. That meant Sue Anne could start making one stocking for each of their children and grandchildren out of her husband’s well-worn coveralls and farm shirts. He never took a liking to t-shirts so every day he put on a button up shirt, either cotton for the summer or flannel for the winter, and set to work with the animals, making repairs on the barn or fence, or plowing or bush hogging the fields. 

Carl could several years’ work out of each shirt before his wife started eyeing them for one of her projects. She would say, “I think it’s about time to retire that,” as she pointed to an article of clothing. He chuckled every time then fussed, making the case that whatever it was still had “a couple good wears still left in it.” The coveralls seemed to wear out a little bit faster, even though they were made with thicker material. Mending fences, chasing pigs, and hopping up and down on the tractor earned plenty of tears, rips and stains on the legs and seats.

Mid fall brought quieter and earlier evenings, giving them a little more time in the evening to sit together and watch TV, play a game, or listen to some music while reading the paper. Sue Anne looked forward to gathering material from past years and getting Carl’s new additions, then designing the stockings for each child and grandchild. She considered how to pair the old scraps with the newly worn out clothes. Every member of the family looked forward to seeing how she made some Christmas magic out of a bunch of rags.

December came and, sure enough, Sue Anne had stockings for each of their three children and eight for the grandchildren. Their kids and grandkids celebrated Christmas morning in their own homes, but came to the farm house for a big Christmas dinner around 2 o’clock. Sue Anne and Carl enjoyed a quiet morning at home before setting out snacks for the kids and getting most of Christmas dinner in the oven. They made sure to stop every once in a while to enjoy the quiet before the marvelously loud chaos that arrived with the grandchildren.

“Christopher! Come outside. I want you to see what I got for Christmas!” James hadn’t even made it inside the door, nor greeted his grandparents, before yelling for his older cousin to come out and see his new remote controlled truck. 

“Hold on! Let me grab my coat.” James flew through the kitchen, grabbing his coat – and a kiss on the cheek from his grandmother – before heading out the door.

“Wait! I want to come too!” James’s little sister Kayla hated to miss out on any fun.

The rest of them arrived, bringing the chaos with them. The kids ran in and out of the house so much that Carl finally gave up on yelling at them to keep the door closed. Instead, he went out for more wood and kept fires going to stave off the cold. Sue Anne insisted on keeping a potbelly stove in the kitchen in addition to their large fireplace with its great hearth in the living room. Carl hated to admit it, but the stove did a better job heating the house than their furnace most days.

Their adult children gathered either in the kitchen or around the dining room table to talk and share stories of their mornings, waking to Santa’s gifts and watching the kids open presents. Each took turns checking in with Sue Anne and Carl about the farm and how things were going. Even though they saw each other regularly, Christmas still offered an important time to catch up with one another. Taking shifts, the children and older grandchildren helped Sue Anne by setting the table, preparing a dish for lunch, fetching wood, or unloading the dishwasher to get it ready for the next round. Sue Ann loved how the work flowed seamlessly from one chore into another, attesting to how they still worked well together as a family team.

After dinner, everyone sat around the Christmas tree in the living room and the grandchildren ripped open presents. Every year Sue Anne and Carl hoped it would last a little longer than the twenty minutes it took for the stack of presents to be reduced to scattered piles of crumpled wrapping paper and discarded boxes. Carl smiled with proud relief as he watched his children struggle with batteries and switches, replacing him as master of everything related to toy operation.

Samantha, one of the older grandchildren, piped up about getting their stockings from the special tree that stood by the front door. Every year Carl cut a small but sturdy tree from the farm that he knew could hold the stockings his wife lovingly made. The children and grandchildren stopped by the tree first thing as they arrived in order to see what theirs looked like each year.

Samantha and Christopher fetched the stockings and passed them out around the room. Their grandmother made sure to embroider names on each of the stockings so they would know which one belonged to whom. Carl and Sue Anne listening to the kids and grandkids compare their stockings, figuring out which pairs of coveralls and shirts Sue Anne had used. 

“Mama! I can’t believe you finally talked Dad into retiring that shirt. We gave that one to him six Christmases ago and for the past three years I’ve been waiting to see it show up in one of our stockings. Honestly I’m surprised it lasted this long.” Kelly, the oldest daughter, held up her stocking and pointed to a strip of bright orange, purple, yellow and blue plaid material.

“Well, baby girl, you bought me a good shirt that year. It lasted me a long time! And I liked wearing it during the warm part of hunting season because I knew no hunter would mistake me for a deer wearing that.” Carl grinned and winked at his daughter as everyone in the room busted out laughing.

When most of the stockings had been emptied, Kaylee yelled to the room, “Who got the jar of dirt this year?”

“I did!” responded her little cousin Amber.

“I got the jar of water!” said Kaylee’s older brother Zachary.

“All right you two, come over here then and I’ll give you your presents.” Everyone turned their eyes to Carl, waiting to see what the big gifts he chose this year. He delighted in his special contribution to the stocking project. Although he and Sue Anne packed them together, he decided which two lucky stockings would receive either a little jar full of dirt from the field or a jar full of water from the creek that ran through their farm.

Zachary and Amber sat on either side of their grandfather, looking at him expectantly as he reached deep into his pockets. With one hand he pulled out a couple of bills and two other things that look like eggs at the end of keychains.

“First, each of you gets a two dollar bill printed in the year you were born.” He held up the money so the kids could see the unique image depicting the signing of the Declaration of Independence on the back. “Go ahead and take those to one of your parents before you lose them. They’ll save them for you to have when you get older.” The two kids did just as their granddad asked then ran right back to his sides.

“Now I have no idea what these things are called nor why they’re such a big deal but the lady at the store told me that every kid had been asking for these all year,” Carl hung the two egg-looking toys from a finger of each of his hands.

“Oh, my God! Is that a Tamagotchi? You’re so lucky!” James yelled from his seat between the tree and his mama, who quickly slapped him on the back of his head before saying, “James! Don’t take the name of the Lord in vain. It’s just a toy.” The adults laughed as they watched the kids gather around the two lucky winners showing off their prizes.

“Granddad, why do you put one jar of dirt and one of water in two stockings every year? Why dirt and why water? It doesn’t make any sense. Why not just put the special toys in the stockings in the first place?” Amber studied her grandfather as she waited for his answer.

“Well, Peanut, that’s because that water and that dirt are the most valuable things we have here on the farm. Aside from the birth of Jesus, I reckon they’re the greatest gifts God gave us. By putting those in the stockings I’m sharing them with you. Your grandmother and I make the money we use to buy your presents every year because of that dirt and water. They have fed you, your parents, me and your grandmother, my mom and dad, and my grandparents over the history of our family. So be sure you take your little jar of dirt home and put it on your nightstand or your dresser. Look at it every day and give thanks to God that we have it; same as I look at your picture every day on my nightstand and give thanks to God that I have you.”

Amber set her toy aside and climbed in her grandad’s lap, nuzzling her cheek into his beard. “Thanks, Grandad. I promise I will.”

30 years have passed since that morning. Sue Anne died 11 years ago with Carl following just six months after. He told the kids he couldn’t bear to live as long as she wasn’t in the world. 

By that time, Amber and her family had moved into the old farm house with her grandparents to take care of them. She and her cousin Christopher took over running the farm once they graduated from college and got married. Christopher built a house on the other end of the property for his family, and they met in the middle to tend the fields and take care of the livestock.

The rest of the grandchildren moved outside the area but still came home for Christmas. It remained a tradition to gather at their grandparents’ to celebrate. No one learned to sew, so instead of hanging stockings on a tree by the door, the grandchildren gathered with their kids and parents at the cemetery to visit Carl and Sue Anne at noon on Christmas Day. One of them brought one large jar of soil and one large jar of water to place on the gravesite. Another brought hot chocolate and everyone would share a story or two about their grandparents and the history of their people. The joy of their grandparents featured in most of the stories as well as the importance of the dirt and the water of the land that continued to feed them.