Each year, when our two-week Christmas vacation began, we would pack up the family and all of our gifts into our car and drive about 300-400 miles to Toledo, Oregon, where Mary Lou’s family lived. We would brave all kinds of weather conditions, once having to divert off of Interstate-5 and take Highway 97 at Weed, California, and driving up the east side of the Cascade mountains and crossed over them to get to Eugene, Oregon. We were chained up and could only go about 30 MPH from Weed until just before Eugene. As scary as some of the car trips up to Oregon where, they paled when it came to the sudden sickness that struck our combined families one Christmas.
Each year, we would share gifts and flu viruses at Christmas time, but this year was exceptional. Mary Lou’s parents raised their two daughters in a nice two story, three bedroom, two bath house. The two girl’s bedrooms were upstairs, so when we invaded this house for Christmas, the two families each took one of the upstairs bedrooms. We had the larger room because of our larger family. We had a queen-sized bed, often a crib, and lots of floor space for sleeping bags. Some of the family members would sleep downstairs in Grandma and Partner’s room on the floor or in the living room, on the floor. The point is, we were packed into this house, but we never minded. That is until this particular year.
I might add that this house had a septic system that was fine for two or even four people, but when the Christmas invasion occurred, the house may have contained as many as 15-20 people. This was a very rainy time of year for that area, so the back yard, where the leach lines lay, was always pretty water-logged. As can be imagined, the toilets didn’t work well, and the drains didn’t drain very quickly while we were there.
I don’t remember who got sick first, but after a few times of someone coming into the living room and announcing that they didn’t feel well that we got pretty good at hurrying the “not well” person to the bathroom. There were many clean-ups needed on that thick living room rug, and sometimes one person getting sick would spark someone else to do the same. It got so chaotic that we wrote a poem about the whole experience:
Memories of Christmas, 1994
‘Twas the dawn before Christmas, when what would appear,
But the floors full of barf; and on the walls…OH DEAR!!!
Jason was slipping and sliding down the hall, When his mother saw him, she started to bawl!!
Business taken care of, they went back to bed, in hopes there would be nothing else to dread.
Christmas came; there was a lot to adore, then Jesse upchucked on the living room floor!
The football crowd was struck with horror, And quick as a flash, they flew out the door!!
Tracie Anne was having her problems on the can, trying and trying and trying again.
After a dose of medicine, she was feeling renewed, whispering, “Mary Lou, I haven’t seen the plunger lately, have you?
Cori was sniffing and snuffing ‘round the house. Looking for kleenex…we were ALL OUT!!!
With the searches concluded we all settled down, for a nice quiet game with the family gathered ‘round.
When what to our wondering eyes did appear, But Sarah’s white face, OH DEAR, OH DEAR!!!
She was sent to the bathroom, quickly she ran. BULLSEYE, someone finally hit the can!!
That night she sat up, making those now familiar sounds, And filled up the pan, ‘least ten times round.
Mary Lou would gasp, Brian would groan. Is she hitting the pan? I hope so, I hope so!!
‘Tis the day after Christmas, our fingers are crossed For none of the cookies have recently been tossed.
We are hoping and praying and holding our breath, That we won’t be next to look like warmed-over death.
Grandma’s postscript…
The families are departed, I’m back to my knitting,
But it will be awhile, before in the living room, I am sitting.
The aroma still lingers, but not to despair, I take a deep breath, and vision them there!!
Years later while looking back on our Toledo Christmases, we started to put two and two together in regards to the storing of the turkey and people getting sick. Not all of us realized that Mary Lou’s mom would store the turkey in the laundry room, because there was so little room anywhere else. She figured it was cool enough in there to keep the turkey edible. We all think she might be wrong in this assessment. We might have been getting sick from the turkey, not from sharing viruses like we had originally figured. This is a family holiday tradition that we decided was not something we wanted to carry forward.
Swagerty-Aldrich Family Web Site 