At the Door

Funny little story that means nothing: usually my family goes out for dinner on Christmas Eve, but the family has been shrinking a bit over the years. My sister now spends the evening with her boyfriend's family, and this year my brother had to work. (He's a restaurant manager.)

My mother made a lot of phone calls to find a place that was open and serving dinner past 6 PM, but had no luck. We had suggested going to where my brother works, but it's a 40 minute drive from her house, and she was worried about what the weather might be doing, so she found a place whose kitchen was staying open long enough for us to get takeout. Everything was very good.

We had settled down to eat when there was a very faint tapping at the front door. Now, I should explain: a few years ago my mother installed those wireless doorbells, but they would ring almost every time the wind blew, so she removed the batteries and put up little signs that say "please knock." So it seemed likely that someone was indeed at the front door, though no one was expected. Her dog, who barks at everyone and everything, never noticed or moved from his perch just outside the kitchen. I guess he was too focused on our food.

I got up to have a look, and my mother called after me, "Use the peephole." I looked through the glass and saw the top of a very short person's head, which wasn't too helpful, so I opened the door. There was a small woman standing there with a bright red food container in her hand. I said, "Can I help you?" She kind of squinted up at me and eventually said, "I don't know you." I offered, "I don't know you either." She thought about that for a moment and countered with, "Is Val here?" So she was known to the household after all, just not to me.

Turns out she lives next door, and was bringing over banana bread and fudge. That house is an unusual two-family rental in a neighborhood of single-family owner-occupied homes, so it's been decades since I had any idea who was living next door. Also, according to my mother, the elfin woman kind of likes to drink, and clearly she was already well into her personal Christmas Eve celebrating, which would explain the slow reaction time and the general sense of puzzlement. But for a moment it seemed like something out of bizarro Dickens: The Ghost of Christmas Drunk.