Hello again all: I wanted to write one more Christmas story for all of you. This one only starts in Wapakoneta but is special for many of the people that was part of this special time. But 1st I need to give you some background leading up to this so hope you will bear with me. Back in the summer of 1990 my good friend Millie Schaub obtained a trailer on the back side of Lake Amanda. We all had a ball out there that summer. But the following fall Millie moved to the Cincinnati area. Millie had every intention of keeping this trailer and coming back during the summer months to enjoy it and had asked her brother and one of my best friends Mark Schaub if he would keep an eye on it for her. One night of January 1991 brought a bad winter storm with high winds and snow. We only ended up with a few inches of snow luckily but the winds had been fierce all that night. The next day I stopped over at Marks house and he asked me if I would ride out to Lake Amanda with him to check on the trailer. This trailer was a old 1950s mobile home and burgundy in color. We pull through the gate and start to drive back to the trailer. But it looked weird from this vantage point. It didnt look burgundy at all it looked black. As we go up the back drive and get closer we see now why it looks black. The winds had blown it over on its side and the black bottom was facing the lake. We get out of the car and the front windows were shattered. We crawl in through the window and the place is pretty well totaled. We come back to Marks house and call Millie and tell her what has happened. She is devastated but there is really nothing she can do and asks Mark if he will clean up the mess and pretty well gives the place to Mark. Ill go into more detail another time but over the next few years many of my family and friends buy up several of the trailers on this side of the lake and form a great bond with most of the people that camped there. So now back to my memory. Over the course of the ten years we spent out there I decided to have a Christmas night camp out for anyone that would want to brave the weather. This became a tradition for many of us. Some were brutal with 10 or more of snow. One Christmas night it was warm for December with a low of 45. But the one I want to talk about was brutally cold. This was about 1994. That Christmas Day the high was only like 10. The forecast for that night was -15 degrees. Luckily there was no wind that night and such a calm night. We had a huge old tractor tire rim we used for our fire pit. I would always be the 1st out to the trailer to get things warmed up. Lake Amanda didnt have electric during the winter months and at that time we didnt have a generator either ( later we all pooled our money and bought one). Daniel Baker and I bought the trailer 2 doors down from Marks. It also was a old mobile home from the 1950s. Somebody had built a enclosed room onto the front of it so we made this room a 2nd bedroom for Baker and the other 1/2 a kitchen. We had a full sized stove that ran off propane that we used this time of year to heat the trailer. I remember stepping out of my car that evening just as the sun was beginning to set. The sun blazed its amber color across the ice covered lake. I walked down to our beach area and sat and watched the sun set. It was so cold but yet so beautiful. Everything was covered in a heavy frost and the suns rays were casting amber everywhere and sparkling everything you looked at. The lake was playing music for me as well. The ice was contracting and expanding and as the ice would crack it would send out a high pitch ping that would echo all across the lake or a deeper tone that sounded like when somebody would take a long bladed hand saw and shake it to make the warbling sound. These sounds to me were amazing. I sat there all alone thinking of what people were missing out on. I walk back up to the trailer and open it up and start the oven. I unload my car for the nights activities. I them would stuff the fire pit as full as possible with wood and get a fire lit. By about 8 or 9 oclock that night as people finished up there Christmas time with family and friends they would start to pull into the campground. Many would bring all their wrappings and boxes to burn. Everyone that camped on this side of the lake would show up. I always promised if they would show up I would be able to keep them warm and boy did I. The oven would heat the trailer to about 80 degrees. I had several kerosene lanterns to light the place up. A old 1960s battery powered radio that had great volume for music. And the MASSIVE fire burning outside. Most of us diehards would sit around the fire while the tenderfoots enjoyed the warmth inside. This Christmas night of 1994 brought out many people and was our best one to me. About 30 people showed up that night. With it being such a calm cold night was easy for everyone to stay warm. But walk away to pee somewhere with it being -10 you did your business and got right back to the fire to warm up lol. We all drank well into the wee hours of that night and burned almost 2 full sized truckloads of wood. The next morning was one of the most amazing things I had every seen in my life. I was the 1st one up and went out to rebuild the fire to make a good old fashioned country breakfast over the fire. We made bacon, eggs, biscuits and gravy in the dutch oven. and toast over the open fire for all the people that had spent the night. I wasnt paying much attention when I was rebuilding the fire except that we had this huge ring around the fire ring where the heat had melted the frost back and had dried everything out. I get the fire going and walk back inside to grab something a little warmer to wear. I come back out and grab a chair and scoot it closer to the fire and light a cigarette. I lean back and look up over where the massive fire had been the night before. I was stunned at what I saw. The trees above the fire ring were the old Sycamore and Cottonwood trees. These trees were huge and tall many being 50 foot or more. Anyway I look up and in a perfect circle hang all these huge massive long icicles that look like stalactites from all the branches. Then just behind all the huge icicles hangs another perfect circle of small icicles and then behind them the whole rest of the lake and campground was covered in heavy frost. I so remember thinking to myself as I am waiting for everyone to wake up that we literally burned a hole through winter that night. Everyone eventually gets up with massive hangovers and eats breakfast. We all pitch in and pack up and seal the trailer back up and look forward to the coming springtime when we will return for another year of many memories to be made
Posted on: Sat, 20 Dec 2014 12:54:55 +0000
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