Page 27 - voices-2022-12
P. 27
“thank you very much, everybody!” for the gifts Living in the old gold mining town of Dutch
I was about to receive. Flat in the Sierra Nevada mountains was a great
The first round of gifts given out did not time in my life. Yes, at 3500 feet, we had snow.
involve my fort. Nor the second, or the third. The town looked like one of the picturesque
I was beginning to panic! And then, it was all Christmas cards with the church steeple’s roof
over! I crawl over to the tree and look under it covered in snow, and the whole area with the
to see if someone missed my “secret” gift I had greens of the pine trees and icy streams adding
already “found” on Christmas Eve. Yet, alas, to the ambiance of the holidays. It was a great
there was no other gift there, let alone a wild time for me to be a thirteen-year-old kid. One
west fort that I was now realizing would never be of my chores was to go and get the Christmas
mine. I did not dare ask, “what happened to my tree and bring it back to the house so my father
fort?” Because then they would know I had been could set it up in the bay window of the dining
sneaking and peeking. room. This was not going to a Christmas tree lot
To this day, that gift and buying a tree. This was a hike into the forest
is still a mystery. I areas surrounding Dutch Flat, cutting down,
do know I asked my and then dragging home the seven or eight-foot
grandmother many, tree. After all, that year I had earned my “Paul
many years later Bunyan Woodsman Award” from Boy Scouts
about it, and then which meant I had the skills, I knew which end
my mother. Neither of an axe to use, and had demonstrated how to
one knew what I was fell a tree and the safety required to do so. Off I
talking about. Did I went, three trees were to be my lot that day for
dream this up? No, I neighbor, grandmother, and us. Me the intrepid
just think one of the explorer. Axe, bow saw, and rip saw with my sled.
four adults saw that In those days, you could wander off and just cut
the gift package had down a tree in the area. It never seemed to cause
been tampered with any concern whether it was from Pacific Gas
and decided not to & Electric, Southern Pacific, or (gulp) federal
give it to me to teach land. Permit? Permit? “We don’t need no stinkin
me a lesson. permit.” Three hours later I emerged, face
VOICES! | DECEMBER 2022 27
