Christmas Eve night. The mountains of North Carolina were giant silhouettes in the darkness. Sheriff Andy Taylor sat on the bench outside the courthouse, watching the stars.

It had been a hard year. Maybe the hardest of his career. The sheriff was downhearted, which didn’t happen often. But then, sheriffs have feelings too.

When it started to snow, Taylor shoved his hands deep into his coat pockets and slipped into a trance. Christmas morning was only a few hours away, and he wanted to feel cheerful, but he couldn’t seem to make it happen.

His deputy joined him on the bench. The scrawny, high-strung lawman had just finished doing his nightly rounds, shining a flashlight into storefront windows; checking doorknobs. All quiet in Mayberry.

“Whatcha doing, Ange?” said his deputy. “Why the long face?”

Taylor flashed a fake smile. “I’m just looking at stars.”

The deputy was obviously concerned, but Taylor hardly noticed. He was too busy thinking about all he’d seen during his years serving this sleepy hamlet. He’d seen it all. Or just about.

He’d

once seen the town drunk ride a cow down mainstreet. He’d seen a local goat eat dynamite. He’d jailed bank robbers, swindlers, chicken thieves, speeders, escaped convicts, moonshiners, and Danny Thomas.

Life was moving too fast. The world had gone from AM radios to color TVs. He’d watched the tailfins on Chevys and Fords get taller each year. He’d seen skirts get shorter, hairstyles get shaggier, music get louder, and people get meaner. Airplanes gave way to rocketships. A man hit a golf ball on the moon. Divorce was becoming more fashionable than blue jeans.

But this year…

This year was a humdinger. It was worse than the rest. This was the year the world fell apart. People in town were more frightened and skittish than ever before. And sometimes it seemed like nothing in Mayberry was going right.

Taylor looked at the…

I was 5 years old. I was with my friends, loitering behind the Baptist church. We sat on the concrete retaining wall overlooking the creek bed. We were practicing our spitting.

Mark Anderson arrived in a rush, rosy-cheeked, struggling to catch his breath. He held a cookie tin in his hands.

“I got’em,” Mark said.

Mark opened the tin and distributed the precious contraband. We knew he’d risked his life to smuggle this delicacy across the frontlines of his mother’s kitchen.

They were orangish strips, seasoned with cayenne. I took one bite and my world exploded.

It was like looking directly into a leafblower. The entire universe opened in a singular moment of spiritual oneness. All of a sudden, the work of Brahms, Webern, and Bartók immediately made sense. Suddenly I understood 19th century French poetry. All at once I grasped the transitory nature of existence, although, technically, I was still at an age where I peed the bed.

“What are these?” a newcomer asked with a mouthful.

“These,” said Mark sagely, “are my mom’s cheese

straws.”

Cheese straws.

If you’ve never had cheese straws, I hope you get some this Christmas. They will blow your hair back. Imagine a crumbly, savory, buttery, floury concoction, baked with enough cheddar to turn your bowels into stone.

Mark Anderson’s mother delivered her cheese straws to our doorstep every Christmas season. Her straws would inspire fistfights within my household.

No sooner would her biscuit tin arrive than my old man would confiscate the container like a purse snatcher. My mother would cut him off at the backdoor, threatening to alter his anatomy with a melon baller.

One year my mother actually tried making cheese straws, but it was a disaster. Her straws came out like briquettes of Kingsford charcoal, only with less flavor. Because as it turns out, cheese straws are fragile things to prepare. Almost like a fine soufflé, or a batch…

Today I had a phone interview with a 6-year-old from Wyoming. The reason for this interview was because this boy has alleged magical powers. I had to get to the bottom of these claims.

Of course I was excited to meet someone possessing supernatural abilities. But if I’m being honest, I was more excited to meet someone from Wyoming. I’ve never met anyone from this state. I was beginning to wonder if Wyoming existed.

Have you ever seen satellite images of the United States at night? The photos show lights from major cities, stringing across North America like a giant glowing vascular system. There is always a huge dark spot over Wyoming.

This is because Wyoming only has 579,000 residents. And to give you an idea of how few that is: the Atlanta metro area has 6 million.

To put it another way: Wyoming is 97,914 square miles, but within the entire state there are only two escalators. This is absolutely true. They’re both located in the town of Casper, and they’re both in banks.

So it was important to investigate these magic claims. You can’t have 6-year-old Wyoming residents going around professing otherworldly capabilities. Next thing you know, you’ll have 6-year-olds in Michigan claiming Detroit has a professional baseball team.

This whole thing started last week when an ordinary 6-year-old boy learned that his uncle was going through a painful divorce. The boy became so concerned about his uncle that he told his mother he wanted to use his “magical powers” to make his uncle feel better.

“Magical powers?” his mother said. “What?”

The boy’s powers consisted of dictating a message to his mother who typed an email that read:

“You’re an awesome uncle and I love you so much because you’re the best! I’m thinking about you today!”

The uncle was so touched by this magic that he almost cried. Except that men from the Cowboy State don’t…

Carol was depressed. Long-term isolation does that to people. She has a compromised immune system, so she’s been isolating for about a year.

Lord, has it been that long already?

Her groceries come by delivery. Her dinners are microwavable. She watches a lot of TV. Many of her friendships have fallen by the wayside. So have activities like church, shopping, volunteering, holiday potlucks, and exchanging Christmas gifts.

So when Carol saw the furry creature on her porch last Monday night, it made her feel something warm inside. She felt a little less isolated. The kitten was tan-colored, curled beneath one of her porch chairs, meowing.

The irony here is that Carol is not a cat person. She normally dislikes cats. But then, this wasn’t a cat, was it? This was a friend.

She stooped to pick up the kitten. She fed it. She stroked its fur. It was an instant love connection. She told the cat there was one simple rule to be observed: no sleeping indoors. The animal was to sleep only in

the garage. But cats aren’t big on rules. So currently, each night the kitten sleeps on Carol’s forehead.

“I think this cat saved me,” she said. “My house isn’t empty anymore.”

Meanwhile, in Southern Illinois, Larry’s mother passed away. The funeral was socially distanced, only 11 people attended. The family took no chances with its elderly. People spaced themselves apart. The preacher wore a respirator.

After service, Larry was cleaning out his mother’s bedroom when he found boxes in her safe. They contained love letters between Larry’s mother and late father. Hundreds of them.

Each letter, written in perfect penmanship. Each one, using the poetic, flowery language that American lovers once used before they eventually discovered the lyrical qualities of, for example, the pile of poo emoji.

Larry read all the letters in order. He was able to recreate the entire romance between his parents. He…

DEAR SEAN:

My grampa is not with us any more, he is been really sick last week and now it’s all over. I don’t know what I’ll do now he’s dead, since he was always my best friend. I really don’t know why I’m tellin you all this, but you seem like it’s ok to do.

Thank you,
THIRTEEN-IN-MONTGOMERY

DEAR THIRTEEN,

If you get nothing else out of my feeble words, please remember my next sentence because I believe your grandfather would want you to know this:

You’re going to be okay.

Now, I don’t know how long this process will take. And I don’t know when it will begin. But the main thing to know is that today is not the end.

When I was your age, after my father died, I made a weird discovery about people. You’re going to think this is absolutely ridiculous, but I’m going to tell you about it anyway. And I do this for a very important reason. To meet my total word count.

As a kid I noticed that whenever people asked other people how they were doing,

they always answered from a list of five basic responses.

So let’s pretend someone asks you the following question:

“How are you?”

Take a moment to think about how you might answer this question right now. Within our culture, here are the five basic answers:

—Not too good.
—I’m fine.
—I’m okay.
—Doin’ pretty good.
—I’m great.

These are deceptively simple responses, but they’re deeper than you might think. And the reason I share these with you is because I suspect you land somewhere on this informal scale right now.

Let’s start with the first: “Not too good.”

This is the most uncommon response. Which is a shame, because it’s often the truth.

When someone asks how you’re doing, people rarely EVER answer, “Not too good.” We humans are…

To the child we never had. I am writing to you today because it is my wedding anniversary. And I get reflective on days like this. On each anniversary I usually feel the overwhelming sensation that I have won the Florida Lotto. Because in many ways I have.

You see, I am still very much in love with your mother after these years of marriage. And I don’t know how I found this proverbial lucky lottery ticket. But what can I say, kid? Sometimes in this life you actually win.

At one time we’d even hoped to have a son or daughter. But alas, nobody can win all the time. Thus, you exist only within my imagination.

Although I still love you a lot. And if you were here, seated on my knee, that’s exactly what we’d talk about. Love. I'd tell you everything I know about it. Because my biggest beef with my own species is that we get love all wrong.

Take me. For the first half of my life

I had no idea what the stuff was. Which is a downright tragedy. How come other creatures within the animal kingdom seem to comprehend romantic love better than we humans do?

Canada geese mate for life. Wolves do too. And whales have such elaborate courting rituals they make humans appear as sensitive as Pop Tarts.

And yet we write huge novels about love. Movies are made about it. Trillions of songs are penned about it. People are constantly trying to understand it, grappling with it, fighting for it, chasing it, or struggling to believe in it.

But somehow we still get it all wrong.

As you grow (hypothetically, of course) the first falsity they’ll teach you about romantic love is that it’s all about good looks. This is drilled into kids’ heads from infancy. Boys are taught to go looking for Jayne Mansfield, and girls are sent out…

DEAR SEAN:

I’ve been reading your stuff for a while now... And I wanted to offer a gentle word from one author to another.

Please take a break from themes involving COVID-19, I suspect other people like me are getting sick of you writing about it. Truthfully it is getting very old. Just a little professional advice.

Thank you,
AUTHOR-IN-GEORGIA

DEAR GEORGIA:

Well, the first thing I owe you is an apology. I am sincerely sorry. This is quite embarrassing, and I feel ridiculous because what you say is absolutely true. I freely admit it.

So do you know what I did today?

I heeded your professional advice. That’s right. Today, keeping with your smart suggestion, I tried NOT to think about COVID-19. Not even once. To distract myself I went Christmas shopping at a local store.

No sooner had I pulled into the store’s parking lot than I was forced to wait in a long line of cars. Because, you see, the storefront is closed to physical shoppers and person-to-person business.

Luckily, my wife had

already shopped online, so all I did was pick up our order. It was easy. An employee wearing a clear plastic Darth-Vader-style face shield opened my vehicle door and placed bags into my backseat.

This is called “touchless” shopping. No money exchanged hands. There were no smiles. Not even a “Merry Christmas.” The employee only said, “Stay safe.”

“Safe?” I chuckled. Obviously this employee hadn’t read your helpful email. So I informed her that people are “sick” of “themes involving COVID-19,” and that this was all getting “very old,” so she should quit harping on it. I told her this was my professional advice.

She took it well. I hope insurance will cover my shattered windshield.

Next, I went to a favorite lunch spot, a place I’ve been frequenting for years. But, sadly, they’re closed and the building is for sale. Turns out…

It’s early evening. A canned choir is singing in our living room. The stereo plays “In Dulci Jubilo,” and the Cambridge Singers sing:

“In dulci jubilo,
“Nun singet und seid froh,
“Unsers Herzens Wonne…”

My eyes keep landing on our little Nativity set, which is on our sofa table. Because after all, this is what the choir is singing about.

The manger scene’s plastic shepherds are kneeling. Mary looks exhausted. The wisemen are holding Monopoly game pieces because I lost their gifts when I was 9 years old. Poor Joseph has been severely disfigured by dogs who mistook him for a chew toy.

“Leit in praesepio,
“Matris in gremio.
“Alpha es et O…”

My mind is stuck in ancient times. I am thinking about when mankind wrote these choral melodies, during the age of sheep-tallow candles and burlap tunics. Back when your average working stiff had a life expectancy of 31 years, and people’s phones couldn’t even shoot decent video.

These songs belong to our ancestors. Songs like

“Lumen Hilare,” ”Adeste Fideles,” “Veni Emmanuel,” “Jesus Refulsit Omnium.”

You might not recognize the titles, but you’d know the melodies. Some tunes predate the plow, Greek fire, the printing press, and the Dave Clark Five.

“Jesus Refulsit Omnium” was composed in 336 AD.

“Veni Emmanuel” traces its origins backward 1,200 years.

“Adeste Fideles” harkens to the seventeenth century.

But “In Dulci Jubilo” is my favorite. It was first introduced in 1328, and would have been chanted by monks while a Bubonic Plague was making a serious attempt to wipe out the human race.

Somehow these ancient Yuletide carols have lasted and are our link to early man. Amazingly these chants survived for millennia without transistor radios, LP records, or eight-track cassettes. How? Kingdoms arose and fell. The horse and buggy gave way to the ‘76 Chevette. And Western humans are still singing archaic lyrics about something that happened…

It’s a big place. Lots of rooms. Beeping medical machines. Doctors with charts. The pediatric oncology ward is decorated with plastic holly and greenery for the season. Loud TVs in the kids’ rooms play various holiday movies.

There are some great kids here.

Like 6-year-old Jessie, who just wants to sing. It’s her mission in life. To sing. Ask her what she wants to be when she grows up. “A singer,” she tells the nurses. Cancer has not robbed this child of her song.

The nurses say that life in this ward has been hard since COVID. The virus adds to everyone’s stress. The new protocols, the extra personal protective gear, the beefed up preventative measures. All these kids have compromised immune systems, and this is a global pandemic.

But nurses and doctors are careful not to talk too much about pandemic-related headlines. Not here. There’s no need.

“These families have enough junk to deal with,” says one medical worker. “Our job is to administer help, and if possible, lots of hope.”

So the nurses have

been singing a lot this Christmas season, teaching the kids lyrics to the Yuletide favorites, like “Deck the Halls,” “The First Noel,” and “Away in a Manger,” which happens to be Jessie’s favorite song.

“Can we sing about the little baby with the mange?!” Jessie often shouts.

“It’s not mange!” one of the nurses usually answers with a laugh. “It’s MANGER!”

And the nurses always oblige once they have a minute. At night sometimes, a nurse will stand beside the child’s bed and deliver impromptu concerts for the girl. Jessie usually joins the merriment herself.

Which is one of the things you lose in here, merriment. You also lose a sense of Christmas altogether. Many parents say that when cancer strikes your house, Christmas immediately feels like a big sham.

After all, it’s just another calendar day. What the heck makes Christmas any different…

I got a letter from 20-year-old Shawna, who is recovering from a case of COVID-19 that briefly landed her in the hospital. She is at home on the mend now, but remains stuck in bed for days, drinking gallons of her aunt’s chicken broth.

She wanted to know if I could recommend any Christmas movies to help pass the time.

The first thing to say, Shawna, is that I’m no expert. Most of my favorite movies are considered to be deader than ragtime. Secondly, I don’t have enough room to list them all here, but I’ll hit the big ones.

I begin with “A Charlie Brown Christmas,” which debuted in 1965, and aired every year throughout many people’s childhoods. I’ve been watching this program since I wore rubber underpants and chewed on furniture.

Coincidentally, the Charlie Brown special almost didn’t air on TV this season after a streaming service bought the rights to the program. This would have been a tragedy.

Thankfully, PBS swooped in at the last minute and secured the rights to

air the Charlie Brown special. I’ve never been so grateful to see a show saved from oblivion; the annual Peanuts broadcast was the apex of kid-dom.

Which reminds me, I don’t know how we did it back then, planning our lives around live network TV. It was a wholly different world before streaming services.

Instead of on-demand movies, for example, we had Mama. Mama would consult the newspaper broadcast-schedule with a ferocious eye, weeks in advance, scanning for television shows. Then she would plan our entire liturgical calendar year around “Facts of Life,” “The Love Boat,” and “Magnum P.I.”

Also, today you have the pause button, which has ruined everything. Long ago, back in the Middle Ages, nobody paused anything. People just let their bladders rupture.

We even used to watch the commercials. Like the one where Mister George Whipple, a perpetually frustrated supermarket manager warns…