Skip to main content

Christmas-Eve with Dad

In this episode - Christmas-Eve with Dad . . .


We all have special memories with our Dads at Christmas. Here’s one of mine. While preparing Podcasts for this Holiday season, I was reminded of this treasured memory—enjoy!

As I entered Joe’s Hardware in Fallbrook, California, I was surprised to see a display of W. R. Case and Sons Cutlery Co. knives.

This transported me back to Marshall’s TrueValue Hardware store, on the square in Cuba, Illinois . . . 

You see, just inside the front door, to your left, was an extraordinary display of Case knives. I always had to stop and look at the wide selection, thinking - Someday I’ll be old enough to buy myself one.

Why Case? Well, because that’s what Dad always carried. You see, my Dad was a traditional outdoorsman. A hunter. He loved to hunt; rabbits, squirrels, pheasants, raccoons (coons), and whatever was in season. His spare time was spent in the woods hunting or on a river fishing with his children. No, not just for sport. It supplemented his income. As a boy, I held the game as he skinned and cleaned it for the freezer using his Case knife.

Christmas Eve would find us in the woods Coon Hunting. Not to watch for Santa, but in hindsight, to teach me how to navigate the woods in complete darkness using the stars as your directional compass. Under a velvet black sky with millions of stars, we would walk through the woods waiting, listening for the dogs to tree a coon. It seemed we were always walking in circles.

For you city slickers who’ve never been hunting, it went something like this:

“Good night for Coon hunting, fresh snow on the ground, get your boots and hunting clothes on - it’s cold tonight.”

He would grab his carbide light, spotlight, rifle, cartridges, knife, and dog leach and load the hounds in their dog box in the back of his truck.

“Are we taking Ranger and Nailer tonight?” They were Dad’s most dependable coon hounds.

“Tonight, we’re just taking Ranger.”

“Where are we going?” I asked.

“Out near Grandpa’s.”

He always referred to his father as Grandpa. My Dad was one of nine siblings. Each had married young and had, on average, four to five kids. We had a very large family. Many nights, Grandpa and my Uncle Lyle, Dad’s younger brother, would join us. But tonight, it was just Dad and me.

So we drove out Route 97, took the gravel road, and parked the truck about two miles from Grandpa's house. We could easily see their house from where we entered the woods.

“Ok, turn Ranger loose.”

With snow crunching, we entered the woods, soon to be entirely surrounded by large oak trees. The moon was full; we needed no carbide light tonight.

“You hear that? Ranger has a scent.” Dad said.

“I don’t hear anything.”

“Listen - you can hear him rustling the leaves under the snow and snorting as he tracks that coon.”

About that time, Ranger began to bay, a deep, long bark, almost a howl. As he straightened out of the track, his howling increased in rhythm. As if he were singing a song. Dad would smile, stop, cock his head a little, and listen intently.

“He’s headed north. Towards the house” (Grandpa's house).

We had been walking for a while. I was lost; without Dad, I would have never found my way back to the truck.

“Which way is the house?” he asked me.

Bowing my head, “I don’t know, we’ve been walking in circles.”

“Look up, see the Big Dipper. Follow that arm of the dipper; that’s the North Star. From there, you can find your way anytime.

“What if it’s cloudy?”

“Then you use the pole light from the house as your reference when you enter the woods.”

About then, Ranger began to bark very slowly and steadily.

“He’s treed that coon, let’s go.”

We made our way thru the timber until we found Ranger with his front paws extended up the tree, barking faster now as to say, “That coon is here - right here.”

So, Dad pulls out his big spotlight and scans the tree.

“Quietly, he said, “Look there, follow the light.”

To my wonder, I saw a pair of enormous eyes. It was a Great Horned Owl. He slowly turned his head to the left, then to the right.

“Are you going to shoot it?” I asked.

“Nope, those owls keep the mice down in the barns around here. We’re looking for the coon that Ranger has treed.”

And sure enough, a very large Raccoon was higher in that large tree, in a fork, almost hidden from view.

“Hold Ranger, I’ll shoot him out. When the coon hits the ground, let Ranger go.”

I’m here to tell you when that coon hit, I had no choice. Ranger leaped from my grip, practically dragging me into the fight with him and that coon. Ole’ Ranger was a pro; he latched on to that coon by the neck and quickly took him out.

“Which way to the truck?”

I pointed South; we put Ranger on the leash and headed home.

That was my first time seeing a Great Horned Owl. It’s been years since I’ve been Coon hunting. But that Christmas Eve memory is burned into my mind.

And it was all because of that Case Knife display; go figure.

Merry Christmas!

This is Patrick Ball; thanks for listening. See you in the next episode.

Comments

Anonymous said…
c6-5
Reginald Dwight said…
who else remembers maccomb in the 70's?

Most Popular of All Time

Mom Was Right

In this episode: Mom Was Right (Again!) . . . Remember that old saying, "Mom knows best?" Well, this week, it resonated profoundly. I vividly recall my mother's steadfast remedy for the common cold, which was ingrained in my 1960s childhood: "Rest in bed, drink plenty of fluids, and take aspirin to reduce pain and fever." . . . Or now that I think about it, this may have been a Bayer aspirin commercial–Simple . . . Fast-forward to the age of AI and endless medical information at our fingertips, and guess what? Not much has changed. Yet, somehow, this week, Lori and I were blindsided by a cold—the first in over five years. My incredulous "How could this be?" quickly morphed into a dawning realization. Our company's annual meeting, a melting pot of colleagues from Illinois, Texas, Vietnam, Colorado, Northern California, and the Central Valley, was a veritable petri dish of germs. And, oh, the germs found me! Getting sick, especially after a long str...

Whispers of Spring

In this episode, Whispers of Spring . . . Spring has a way of sneaking in when you’re not looking. One day, you’re shaking off the last chill of winter, and the next, you realize the light has shifted, stretching shadows just a little longer. It didn’t make a big fuss about it—no dramatic entrance, no trumpets—just a quiet unfolding, like an old dog settling into a sunny spot on the porch. Last week, Daylight Saving Time kicked in, which meant we all fumbled with our clocks, grumbled a bit, and then, like frogs taken aback by a warm rain, leapt forward into longer evenings. The sun now lingers, in no rush to set, hanging in the sky like a tossed coin that refuses to fall. With the extra daylight, we find ourselves drawn outside once again, migrating to the back patio like folks are drawn to a warm campfire. The lawn chairs are right where we left them, waiting like old friends. The air hums with wind chimes, their tuned cylinders catching the breeze and weaving together something that...

Special April Fools' Edition: Did You Fall For It?

In this episode: Special April Fools' Edition: Did You Fall For It? (And a Little Baseball Nonsense) Welcome, fellow baseball aficionados and purveyors of the peculiar, to a very special, dare we say unpredictable, issue of On the Fly! Today, the air is thick with . . . well, probably just regular air, but a specific mischievous something is buzzing around. Can you feel it? Does that tingling sensation make you double-check your shoelaces and suspiciously eye any unusual packages? Yes, dear readers, it’s April 1st! A day steeped in mystery, shrouded in playful deception, and frankly, a day where you shouldn't believe anything you read (except maybe this . . .maybe). But before we descend into a whirlwind of whimsical falsehoods (don’t worry, we’ll mostly keep it light!), let’s take a quick, slightly wobbly, historical flight through the origins of this most unreliable of holidays. Whispers from the annals suggest a few intriguing possibilities for why we dedicate this particula...

At 92–Don's Digital Daydream

Listen to the audio here. In a world of his own–lives, ole' Doctor Don, Not one world, but three, 'til the setting of the sun! There’s his Blog-World , so bright, with words all a-whirl, And Book-World , with stories of boy and girl! Then, Day-World , where legs didn't leap, didn't run, Just shuffled and creaked 'til each day is done. But his brain, oh, his mind, it’s zippy and keen, A most curious fellow that ever was seen! At ninety and two, with a twinkle so bright, He met Chatty and said, "What a strange delight!" This box with the answers, so quick and so bold, Of theology and stories, new truths to unfold!" "Integrity, relationships, where do they fit? This thing makes me wonder, bit by bit!" He ponders and pokes with laughter and a grin, "Til POOF! he has gone to a world from within! A world made of words, a fantastical place, Where limits of the body, left not a trace! He Soares, and he zooms, with a thought and a rhyme, Trans...