I’ll bet that I have something no one else in Catahoula Parish has. Want to know what it is? It is truly bizarre, but it is sitting in a prominent position in my kitchen. Give up? I have a haunted stove, haunted by a Jewish ghost. The reason I know it is Jewish, is because at odd times of the day, the control-whatever-it-is will start beeping, and the message ‘Sabbath’ comes up.

It happens every day of the week, trying to shut me down so I won’t be able to cook on the Sabbath and break orthodox Jewish law. I have to press on the clock icon for 10 seconds to get it back to regular time. I also have to press this same icon for 10 seconds to turn on the oven. Sometimes in the middle of baking something, the control will switch to Sabbath, and I have to go through the routine all over again. This is not good when baking a cake or bread or pie, for a cooling oven messes up the cooking process. I can’t just put a cake in the oven and go out to feed the chickens while the cake is baking. The Jewish ghost might decide to shut down the process if I wander away.

This was a bit funny at first, but now it is an aggravation that has me ready to either call Acie Murry, our ace appliance repair man, to see if he can get a new stove brain, or look for a new stove without Jewish inclinations. A person can take just so much beeping at all hours of the day. And to top it off, here it is again, the season for baking goodies to share.

I am not one of those people who has Christmas shopping done by the first of December, never was, never will be. It’s more like I am goaded into shopping for gifts for people who have everything, who need nothing, but still expect me to come up with something for them for Christmas. Books and clothing are usually out, even though I’d rather buy a book than anything else. So, I ponder, and stew until the next to last minute, and breathe a sigh of relief when it’s done.

I do like to think back this time of year, to when we were children, and how we handled Hallowe’en, Thanksgiving and the Christmas holidays. We didn’t think about Christmas until after Thanksgiving, unlike 2023, when decorations for sale are on display in stores by Labor Day. Really, I suppose, one of our favorite pastimes back then, getting ready for the Christmas season, was being in the kitchen while Mama baked.

My baking preparations for Christmas pale in comparison to what my mama did when we were children. She baked cakes and cakes and pies and more pies every Christmas. We had so many cakes that we actually got tired of having dessert. The rest of the year, a cake appeared for birthdays or maybe once a month if there was a church dinner. I never understood why she baked so much at Christmas for just us.

Later in life, I found out that this was an old Southern tradition of having a bountiful supply of sweets for the holiday. They weren’t just for family, but for the visitors that dropped in for coffee and cake during the holidays. To not have cake or pie to go with coffee was disgraceful, I reckon, and she made sure we weren’t disgraced. (Her stove wasn’t haunted, either.)

Once we do get to December, the Elves on the Shelves will be coming down from the North Pole, to spy on the children in the house for ol’ Santa, (even though the boys are all too old for that tale now, but I like tradition). The elf moves from spot to spot every night, to keep an eye on the little ones in the house. The elf that comes to my house is not a run of the mill elf. Oh, no. He has a head a bit larger than the regular elves, so JG named him Fat Head Fred. Mr. Fat Head moves from room to room watching JG until New Year’s Day, when he returns to the North Pole.

When Woodrow was about five, one of Santa’s elves came to his house. That elf would tell on him every day if he was accidentally bad. After about a week of this tattle-tale elf, Woodrow had had enough. He got his toy rifle and told the elf that he was fixin’ to get shot if he didn’t keep his big mouth shut. It must have worked, for Woodrow got gifts that year in spite of the tale-carrying elf.

I don’t recall Drew ever having to threaten the elf at his house, and JG was always courteous and kind to Big Head Fred. But little boys grow up, and don’t believe in the elves anymore, but that’s okay. I still do believe in their magic, and the way they once kept little boys more or less in line before Christmas, even the rifle toting Woodrow.