‘Tis the Season
Troll the Ancient Yuletide Carol!
The Invitation
With my focus on health and recovery, I didn’t give my old homeplace a second thought. I hadn’t been there in a long time, literally decades. I sold the property many years ago and split the profit with my younger sister. I hadn’t been in the county, towns, or communities of my youth since I was young—and now I was growing old. I was not in contact with anyone from Texas, and no one was in contact with me. In fact, if someone from the old days were to walk up and speak to me, I might not know who they were. These facts made it seem quite strange when I received, unexpectedly, a parcel from the mail delivery service.
I was returning home when I saw it. I drove down the driveway and the automatic garage door opened to admit my SUV. I was preparing to pull inside when I noticed that Henry Orban, the postal employee, had left mail stacked at the front doorstep. Curious, I made my out into the cold wind and scooped up the mail. I quickly made my way inside.
Most of the mail was of the usual type, and I would glance at it later. What had seemingly been too big for my mailbox was a wrapped box, and inside the wrapping was another, wooden box. The curious box looked and smelled very much like fresh cedar. A simple latch fastened it, and when I shook it, I could tell that something was inside. I opened it.
Inside the box, there was a scroll. It wasn’t a paper that was rolled up—it was an actual scroll, complete with a wax seal. The seal was a simple but meaningful letter of the alphabet, a signet that I had seen many times in my youth: A lone letter H. I knew immediately that it was from someone in the Haley family, one of the five founding families of Mackenson County.
Honestly, I wasn’t sure how I felt about receiving this correspondence. I had no opprobrious discourse to direct toward my old-time associates, but I had made a new life for myself in Oklahoma. I was finally getting some time to devote to one of my favorite hobbies—writing—and my mental health was improving. What setbacks might occur if I opened myself up to that part of my past? With this in mind, I broke the seal and opened the letter. It was an invitation:
Dear Dr. Roberts,
Your presence is requested at the Winter Solstice Festival in Chapel Hill, Texas.
Join us in the Circle as we Troll the Ancient Yuletide Carols!
December 20-21. We shall gather this year at 11:50 P.M.
The doors will open at 9 P.M.
Festivities begin on Midnight of the Twentieth Day of December.
Feasting follows the festivities.
RSVP
Sincerely,
Elder Haley
PS: Looking forward to seeing you after all these years (Colette and Felicity).
I looked at the other side of the letter. Nothing was printed on it. There was no other information except for a return address on the envelope.
At the bottom of the invitation, following the postscript, were five simple family crests, five shields. The first was marked with a stylized “H,” and below it was the surname “Haley.” The second was my family shield, marked with my name and a “R.” As I knew it would, the third crest was marked with a “W” and represented the Williamson family. The Williamsons built Chapel Hill.
The two additional crests represented the Clarke and Mackenson families. Below the five shields was imprinted a Roman numeral III, which is a unique birthmark shared by all five families, for we all come from the same stock. Every one of us, male and female, has this mark on top of the left hand.
The unexpected letter brought back distant and not unpleasant memories of the families identified in it. I remembered that the Haleys, Roberts, Williamsons, Mackensons, and Clarkes were closely connected in some way, and not just by blood. When I was young, much younger, I listened as my grandfather and father discussed the five groups on a fairly regular basis. It was well known to me and mine that the families were considered to be the “pillars” of the county.
Yes, to my knowledge, our families were treated much like royalty—at one time. Surely this was no longer the case, at least not for the Roberts clan. Much of my family was buried in Mackenson County but I, the oldest, no longer lived in Texas. My sister had pretty much disowned the place. She never ventured there, and I can’t even remember the last time I saw her.
I don’t recall much more about the Roberts family. Most are gone, either out of state or out of the world of the living. Now that I consider it, the Roberts' were closer to other founding families than they were to each other. My paternal grandfather was an absolute cad, incapable of being a gentleman. As I recall, he did not hold me or my sister in high regard—and you’d better believe the feeling was mutual. But I digress, and shall move on with my letter.
Again, the correspondence was definitely not something that I had anticipated. I remember thinking that it seemed to contain unusual wording for an invitation to a Christmas party. I decided to look the address up on the internet. The address was accurate: It identified a real place, Chapel Hill, even though I could find no working phone numbers. That being said, the invitation was hand-written, signed, and sealed by a member of the Haley family. It even had a postscript from Colette and Felicity, two of the Haley girls with whom I went to school. It seemed legitimate.
I recalled Colette and Felicity Haley, twin sisters, from the days of my youth. The girls were descendants of a riverboat captain who traveled the Silver Creek River. I believe he was one of the first Haleys to settle in Mackenson County. I still thought of Colette and Felicity as being girls. By now they would be at least 50 years old. No doubt they had grown children, and possibly grandchildren. I even remembered, barely, when we all used to attend a yearly Christmas party held at one of our family estates. I wouldn’t mind seeing some of those folks again.
I didn’t immediately commit myself to traveling to Texas. First I had to make sure that I had enough medication to carry. I can’t go without it; otherwise I won’t sleep for days. When I made sure that I had access to enough medicine, I had to find someone trustworthy to watch the house: It was bitterly cold outside, and it would be necessary to keep the heat running with no interruptions. It was also needful, generally, to have someone watching the house, picking up the mail, and feeding my two cats.
As it happened, I had the required amount of medicine. Once I decided to go, I responded to the RSVP. I have a neighbor down the road, Mr. Jack Hayes, with whom I am on friendly terms. He spoke to his daughter-in-law on my behalf and she agreed, for a small sum of many, to house sit while I was away. Even better, she had already met my cats, and liked them.
© 2023-2025 Ren Adama
