THE SCARRED OAK. William Walraven
who could sit on the old man’s lap were asked all kinds of questions, like “Do you help your parents?” “Are you good in school?” “Do you do your homework well?” and so on. Naturally, with innocent eyes keeping Black Pete in line of view and with hefty nodding of their heads, the children would answer, “Yes, Sainter Klaas [a short form of Saint Nicholas]” to all questions. In the child’s mind, everything was going in the right direction, and they could expect some nice gifts, but most of the time, the parents would drive a spoke through the wheel by mentioning a couple of misbehaviors of the youngster. This information would make Black Pete angry. Rattling his heavy chain and rolling his eyes would cause the child to portray a deep sorrow or to defend this outrageous interference when everything was going so well.
Eric was in many such situations and discovered already at an early age that his mother was more likely to go along with his answers than his father. At times when his father had an afternoon shift and Eric was only accompanied by his mother, he would end up a winner.
A few years in a row, Eric noticed that a month or so before St. Nicholas Day, his small wheelbarrow was gone. But he received a beautiful new one (in a different color) as the main part of his presents. Some years later, he found out when a big paint chip broke off, how many colors of paint this wheelbarrow had received from his father during his early years. Christmas was always a day to remember, because Christmas and the days leading up to it were always very special to Eric.
On the day before Christmas, when his father sharpened the ax and put his heavy winter jacket on, Eric knew the time had come for him and his father to pick out a Christmas tree in the woods surrounding the village. Eric was kind of stocky in build, and he loved to work with his father, while Johann was slender in build and hated already at a very young age anything that had to do with manual labor.
Eric walked behind and tried hard to step in the same footsteps his father left behind in the soft snow to prevent the snow from entering his wooden shoes. With heavy knitted shawls around their necks and heads, the twosome made their way silently through the harsh cold, windy landscape. The silhouette of his father in front of him with the ax over one shoulder made Eric think of the story of the Woodcutter in the Black Forest his mother had read to the children on one of the longer winter evenings.
Sometimes his father asked if he could carry him, but Eric refused. He wanted to be just like him. Walking behind his father, trying to make the bigger steps, made him breathe heavily, his breath changing to steam just like he saw his fathers’.
Arriving in the woods, his father wiped the snow off a fallen tree, and together side by side, they took a rest from the long journey. Silently, they sat there listening to the eerie sounds of the wind through the trees, the cracking and rubbing of cork dry branches, followed by a tranquil stillness when the wind ebbed. Eric heard the sometimes backbone-shivering sounds, but sitting beside his father, he wasn’t afraid and could feel the strength, closeness, and warmth of his father. Together, out of many, they chose the right tree, and with a couple of powerful cuts by his father’s ax, the tree slowly moaned and groaned as if protesting. Finally subsiding, it fell into the snow. As always, it was a beautiful young tree, seven to eight feet tall. Eric stood there looking at the fallen youngster of the woods.
His love for nature made him sad. This young tree that had taken years to develop in this harsh climate didn’t even have a chance to grow up like its neighboring huge masters of the woods. His father, knowing his son’s feelings, interrupted his thoughts by telling him that it was good for these wild woods to be thinned out so that more sunlight would reach other young trees, who would then have a chance to become giants.
When Eric got cold, his father put him on his lap, opened his jacket, and let Eric nestle himself against the warm body of his father. While putting his arms around him, Eric noticed how rough and big his father’s hands were. He also noticed that one of his fingers was quite crooked on the tip, and he questioned his father about it.
“Oh,” his father replied, “that happened when I was a youngster like you. I got my finger stuck between the heavy doors of the church, but at that time, there was no money in the family for doctors, so my mother put a bandage around it, torn off from an old sheet, and that was it. I guess the finger must have been broken and grew together crooked. It never bothered me. Remember, Eric, in that time, we were really poor. Every penny counted, and there surely was no money to go to a doctor for just a finger.”
His father tied a loop around the base of the tree and put Eric on it so that his wooden shoes could keep him in balance, while his father pulled the tree home.
On his way back, his father stopped a couple times to catch his breath from the heavy pulling and to wipe at the same time the drip off his nose with the top of his rough hands. Eric followed the same gesture as if he had pulled the tree. As they arrive home, the tree’s bottom branches were removed and used all throughout the house behind pictures and wall plaques. The tree itself was planted in a big pail filled with wet sand and moved to the corner of the living room, where for generations his ancestors stood. Now it really was Christmas.
Within a few hours, the whole family filled the house with the Christmas spirit—shining decorations, small candles on the tree, white angel hair, silver paper strips, and the pine smell. Not only the rooms but also the people in it were filled with wonderful Christmas feelings.
The manger (made by his father from rough birch wood), the sheep and shepherds, the donkey, the ox, and the Holy Family all found their places under the tree. The three wise men were located a distance away from the manger and were moved every day a little closer until the thirteenth day after Christmas—the day, as the legend went, they arrived at the manger.
That same evening, the whole family gathered in front of the tree. As they sang Christmas songs, the candles were lit, while all the other lights were dimmed. The sparkling of candlelight into the youngsters’ eyes and the glow on their faces made Christmas in these villages what it was supposed to be—peaceful. Eric was too young yet to go to midnight Mass, but he would stay awake in bed and listen to the village people passing by in subdued voices, walking in their wooden shoes through the snow. The bedroom was cold as only the coal stove in the kitchen and living room was used in the daytime, but Eric cuddled in the warm blankets and didn’t feel this cold. It was Christmas, and with his young head still full of the happenings of the day, he fell into a deep, restful sleep. Christmas Day was not only a day to always a beautiful peaceful day for the villagers. It was a family day; the married sons and daughters would come home in the later afternoon to have a big family dinner.
Before the High Mass started at ten o’clock in the morning, Eric was already at the church so he could spend some time looking at the big manger in front of the church’s altar. It was a big manger, nearly as big as a real stall. The Christ child the size of a real baby lay there in the straw with his arms spread and with a big smile on his face. Mary and Joseph were kneeling beside the child, and Mary, with beautiful rosy cheeks, had a smile on her face, which reminded Eric of the face of his own mother. Shepherds and sheep were all over the place, and the huge ox and donkey lay in the back of the manger, supposed to heat the child with their breath. At least that was what his mother told him. Eric noticed something strange about the ox, and after careful inspection, he came to the conclusion that a chip had come off the ox’s head and it was missing one eye. Someone had painted the whole spot just black, but it looked quite odd to Eric, and he had to laugh at the whole situation.
All through the Mass, they were singing beautiful songs, and whenever Eric knew a song, he did his utmost to sing as hard as he could until one of the nuns who sat behind, watching the children, came over to him and, with a kind of subdued voice, demanded Eric to stop.
When they came home after the Mass, the radio was playing Christmas songs. His mother was preparing for the big Christmas dinner, Johann was reading a book beside the kitchen stove, and his father, sitting in the living room, was talking to one of the neighbors while sipping on a small glass of Dutch gin for Christmas cheer. All in all, it was a real Christmas Day, but for Eric, it was a very boring day. He couldn’t even play that day with Nico, his best friend and neighboring boy, who only was a couple of months younger than Eric. Somewhere around the house was a picture showing the two of them in a baby carriage taken in a meadow. It was impossible