I was 9 when we celebrated our first Christmas in St. Helena. Like other city slickers who would follow him, Jim Pop had overpaid for a 12 acre “spread” out in Conn Valley. At $1,000 per acre we were the laughing stock of the cattlemen at LLoyd Stice’s Feed & Grain. Our “herd” consisted of one drop calf and a white-faced Hereford who began as a bull calf, but thanks to Dr. Talcott was now a bonafide steer.

This was the year of the Marysville floods and getting up and down the mile dirt road to “The Lazy J” was a never ending adventure. In one spot, “the adobe patch” we would often get stuck up to the hub caps going down and coming up as well.

Jim Pop placed rubber door mats and 2”x12” wooden planks by the side of the road so we could jack up that ’56 Chevy station wagon and eventually work ourselves free to continue on to town, or back up to the ranch.

Money was tight back then, but being the Christmas season Jim Pop let us go to Montelli’s and haul a couple of pickup loads of blue shale so the so other members of his family who would join us for Christmas wouldn’t get stuck in the muck.

It worked.

For our young cousins Santa Claus was to be the main attraction (Duh!) but the calves stole the show. You should have seen the look on those kids’ faces. They were visiting the ranch (and no doubt the country) for the first time. Petting “Jupiter and Geronimo” up close can be heady stuff to kids who’ve only seen cattle on TV.

Now get me wrong. As kids, presents were all we thought of. For years, we begged our parents to be able to open just one Christmas present on Christmas Eve. I remember two years when they relented and gave in.

Naturally, my brothers and I chose the biggest packages to open. We each got the same gift. One year it was a desk lamp with a world globe on it—the next year it was a heavy, water proof jacket. That took some of the thrill out of that game.

As a kid, you’d think Christmas was all about the gifts. But for us it was about our relatives. As families were scattered across the country, we never saw one another. So having our grandparents and their kids (our aunts and uncles), plus our younger cousins, was a big deal to us.

Over the years we’d put the kids on the horses, let them pet the cattle and feed the chickens. They never had it so good. Neither did we.

Still, with a family of 30 or so, the presents under the tree mounted up. In fact, it was obscene. The gifts weren’t particularly expensive—but they were plentiful.

After my grandparents’ deaths, the families tried to get together, but like many families, that finally fell by the wayside. Everyone wanted his own family tradition, and who could blame them.

Finally, the unthinkable happened. We would spend a Christmas away from the Lazy J. The Goobs and I left and took the kids to Hawaii. It was odd—foreign—out of kilter. Just like easterners equate snow with Christmas—to us it was rain and green hillsides.

The Hawaiian sun threw us off point. What about a tree? We were in a condo. The Goobs, however had brought over the kids stockings.

What to do about presents? We were used to mountains of them. No room in the suitcases. We decided that we’d go to the Ala Mona shopping center for one hour and each person could buy one gift for each family member. 20 presents total.

I assumed it would be a letdown—a disaster. Instead, it was the greatest Christmas ever. After Mass, we came back to the “condo.” One present each was more than enough. Because like those early Christmases at the Lazy J it wasn’t about the presents—it was about being together. It was about each other. It was about a week of jogging on the beach, taking yoga classes, reading in the sun, surfing, playing Volleyball and Cribbage as a family and just basking in each other’s orbit.

I hope Santa brings each of you whatever gifts you have asked for. But with luck, you will get the best present of all. Presence of Family—the true gift of the Magi. Merry Christmas to one and all.





posted by Jeff Warren @ 10:05 AM
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