Slim Randles'  Home Country

Christmas at the cabin

[December 24, 2009]  Steve had already driven the pickup up to his cabin with the groceries and hay because he knew the snow was coming. And he was coming up, too, in a few days. Coming for Christmas. A special Christmas.

But he had a few more days of work first, and he worked the cattle, fixed some fence and then checked the shoes on Ol' Snort, his personal horse. The mountain was white now, at least the top half of it, and finally Steve saddled Snort and they rode out of town toward the snow. He thought he could probably get Snort to the cabin in a horse trailer -- snow wasn't that deep yet -- but that would take some of the fun out of it. Using a horse trailer would be... well, sensible. But this season calls for fun over good sense, love over practicality. And eye twinkles. Yep, twinkles of the eye went well with saddling a little horse spouting geysers of breath, riding up a mountain when he could be driving, and just having fun with his best friend.

It took four hours, four fun hours, to reach the cabin, tie Snort in his shelter and feed him, and get the fire going enough to start shedding the heavier clothes inside. Steve turned on his battery radio and listened while Rudolph was having his nose so bright, put the coffee water on the stove, and lit the kerosene lamps against the kindness of night.

Then he climbed the ladder into his turret and sipped coffee, looking off over the tops of the black spruces and down into the valley where a cluster of man stars marked the location of the Mule Barn and town and all his friends.

And he heard Snort blow his nose happily as he ate his hay, looked around at the home he had built for himself and wished himself a "Merry Christmas."

Sometimes being a rich man has nothing to do with bank accounts.

[Text from file received from Slim Randles]

Brought to you by "Sun Dog Days," Slim's latest novel. Available at www.slimrandles.com.