From A Lantern in Her Hand by Bess Streeter Aldrich:
On the day before Christmas the snow lay deep on the prairie and the children’s greatest anxiety was whether ‘he’ would find the little house which was half buried. Margaret, with the characteristic ingenuity of the female of the species, suggested tying a piece of bright cloth where ‘he’ would notice it. And Mack, with the characteristic daring of the less deadly of the same, got on top of the low house via a crusty snow bank and tied one of little John’s red flannel shirts to the stove-pipe.
At lamp-lighting, they all hung up their stockings, even Will and Abbie. The children were beside themselves with excitement. By their parents’ stockings they put the little presents they had made for them. They danced and skipped and sang. They cupped their eyes with their hands, pressing their faces to the little half-window and looking out into the night. The gleam of the stars was reflected in the snow, and the silence of the sky was the silence of the prairie.
“I see the Star.”
“So do I. Right up there.”
‘It looks like it was over a stable.”
“Yes, sir. It looks like it was over a manger-stable.”
“Now it looks like it’s stopping over us.”
“Yes, sir, it looks like it’s stopping right over our house.”
p.114-115
Christmas and Christmas reunion and family and sacrifice of parents for their children are some of the threads and motifs that tie together this story of a Nebraska pioneer woman in the latter half of the nineteenth century. Abbie Deal and he husband Will face it all: snowstorms, drought, grasshoppers, disease, and disillusionment, with the land, their children, and even themselves. And yet, the Deals persevere and build a life, and a family that perseveres and reunites every Christmas on the old homestead, even when times have changed and the farm is no longer a working farm.
This family saga was a serendipitous read that I picked up while browsing my library, unaware that so much of the story revolves around Christmas and family relationships and the reminiscences of an old woman who is near the end of her life. I’m not quite that old, but I do mull over many of the same things that Abbie thinks about: the passage of time, the differences and similarities between all my children, their gifts and talents, my faithful husband’s unwavering dedication to all of us, and more. Anyone who lives in Nebraska or has Nebraska or prairie state ties should definitely pickup this history-in-a-story of the pioneers who built that state. I also recommend it as a Christmas read or a sort of melancholy (but also hopeful) read for older adults. Maybe teens as well. Yes, well, maybe everyone, as long as somewhat sentimental but also realistic and practical prose is in your wheelhouse.