I spent the rest of Christmas morning curled up under the TV watching Anne of Green Gables on VHS with my sister. That's how depressed I was. Anne of Green Gables was the story of a young orphaned girl who, despite her "humble beginnings," charms everyone in town with her "fiery spirit" and lives "happily ever after." It was set at the turn of the century in Canada, and in the opinion of this nine-year-old boy, was probably the worst video ever made. I hated it with a passion. But I was so distraught that I didn't care. I watched the whole thing.

After months of Nintendo disappointment, it was almost like I'd gotten used to the pain. It was almost as if I enjoyed it. I sat through Christmas lunch without a word, picking at leftover Jell-O and turkey. My dad asked if I wanted to go outside and throw the football around like we'd done last Christmas, but I declined.

At noon I received a phone call from Zilinski. All around town, despite the panic, levelheaded grandmothers had come through and three-fourths of my friends had received a Nintendo for Christmas, even Zilinski himself. By nightfall countless kids across Kane County would go to bed sporting throbbing headaches and blistered thumbs from a full twelve hours on their new Nintendos. It was a tough pill to swallow.

I wandered around the house in a daze. I fed the gumdrop head of my macaroni Wise Man to Elwood. I even offered to take down all the Christmas decorations, a chore that in years past had been a death sentence. But I didn't mind. I wanted Christmas over with. I was sick of it. The holiday had brought me nothing but trouble and heartache. I counted the minutes on the clock. Day turned to dusk. Dusk turned to night.

"Are you packed yet, Jake?" my mom called up to my room, where I'd been pouting in seclusion for hours. Every Christmas night we loaded up the van and drove up to St. Paul, Minnesota, to visit my mom's side of the family. A normal person could drive it in about seven hours. My dad usually did it in five. That's why we waited until Christmas night to leave. He didn't want to hit any traffic. Where exactly this "traffic" came from, we could never be sure, as Christmas was one of the least congested days of the year, but my dad wanted to avoid it just the same.

"I'll be down in a second!" I yelled back. I tossed a few more He-Men figures into my suitcase and brought it downstairs. The pile of luggage in the kitchen had been growing all afternoon. My mom was not exactly a light packer. She stood next to the mound with my sister, quietly trying to stay out of my dad's way as he sputtered back and forth between the kitchen and the garage, packing the car. If there was one thing the old man hated more than traffic, it was luggage.

"We're going to Minnesota for four days. You've been in the car before, Patty. I've seen you. How much room do you think we have in there?"

"It's mostly gifts."

"What do we need gifts for? How many Christmases do we have to have, for crying out loud?"

"Why don't we just leave in the morning, John, you'll feel better then."

"I'm not hitting traffic!" He carried another three bags out the door past my sister. She was bundled up in her pajamas and coat, already prepared for the long drive ahead. She held Dawn Rebecca tightly.

"Mom?" she asked. "Do you think I can bring Dawn outside when we get to Grandma's?"

"Yes, Lizzy, dear. Maybe we can find her a little hat to keep her head warm."

"Yeah, she's gonna need it. Her hair..." She leaned in, covering the doll's ears. "It's an embarrassment."

"Jake. Grab your coat and get out here," my dad called from the garage.

Oh, great, now what? I put on my new, and decidedly hideous, London Fog jacket that my grandparents had just given to me and I trudged outside. My dad was standing at the edge of the garage holding a shovel.

"Here." He handed it to me. "There's a ton of poop out there. I want it all cleaned up."

"Now?"

"Yeah, now. You've had all week to do it."

"But it's Christmas, Dad."

"I don't care. I want it all cleaned up before we leave. Now, get going."

Reluctantly, I swung the shovel over my shoulder, catching a cool whiff of poo as I pulled it toward me. Of course I had to pick up dog poop on Christmas. Of course I did. It was the perfect end to a perfectly crappy Christmas.

I grabbed a garbage bag, zipped up my coat and stomped through the snow toward the back of the house.

"And don't forget to do the other side of the house behind the shed," my dad called out. "You haven't been back there in months."

"Yeah, yeah," I muttered under my breath. Elwood trotted alongside me as I made my way across the yard toward the shed. My dad was right. I hadn't picked up a single piece of poop back there since probably September. There was poo as far as the eye could see, all the way to the tree line bordering the neighbor's lawn. I sat down on an overturned garbage can and watched my breath.

The stars were already out and the sky was clear. I heard a distant hum of a plane flying high overhead. It was a beautiful Christmas night in Batavia. Sitting there in the cold, I began to play back all the scenes that had taken place over the past few weeks. I thought about the Salvation Army Santa Claus and my missing retainer. I thought about the cute checkout girl and Mrs. Huge-Blow. I thought about Mr. Murphy's burned coat and Miss Ciarocci's smile. I thought about Dan Delund and Timmy Kleen. I thought about my girls' boots and the man in leather pants. They were all steppingstones that I'd imagined were supposed to lead me to a glorious Nintendo victory. But in reality, all they'd done was lead me here to this sad moment. I was alone on Christmas night with a shovel and a garbage bag, staring into a yard of frozen dog poo.

My mind wandered to thoughts of the cab driver, that gruff old pro with all the answers. Maybe he was right. Maybe I'd blown it. I hadn't so much as said Merry Christmas to a single person all year. I'd ruined a perfectly good Christmas, and for what?

Elwood sat down at my feet and stared out into the yard with me. Despite the moon and the stars, it was still pretty dark out. My dad had forgotten to turn on the floodlights. How did he expect me to do a decent job if I couldn't even see? What was he doing right now that was so important? Why couldn't he come out here and help me?

"Hey Dad!" I yelled back toward the garage. "You forgot to turn on the flood lights!" There was no response. I tried again. "Hey Dad! The lights!"

Suddenly, the lights flicked on and a wave of brightness fell over the backyard, making every inch of snow sparkle and every piece of dog crud even more apparent. I rose slowly and looked up toward the trees for the first time.

And then I saw it...

There, high above the frozen dog poo that had become the bane of my Nintendo-less existence was the most beautiful structure I had ever laid eyes on.

"Whoa..."

It was a tree fort—a glorious, two-level, solid-wood tree fort. Freshly painted, with a rope ladder and a red ribbon on its roof.

"Whoa..." I gasped again. It was all I could get out. I stood there awestruck for a moment. Cautiously, I looked around to make sure I hadn't accidentally wandered into a neighbor's yard by mistake. I hadn't. I was still on Doyle soil. I dropped my bag and shovel and made my way toward the tree.

Oh, it was breathtaking—rows and rows of wood slats descending from high up in the snowy branches, gracefully separating in the middle for a large window with two red shutters. And it was high in the air too, very high, high enough to keep out bullies and kid sisters, that was for sure. As I got closer I noticed a little note tied onto the rope ladder. I turned it over. "To Jake. Love, Santa," it read. Sure enough, this tree fort was for me. It was all mine.

Slowly and steadily I climbed up the ladder, carefully ascending past branches and needles. There was a trap door at the top, one that could be opened and closed from the inside. Perfect for secret knocks and last-minute escapes. I pulled myself up through the hatch and stood up on the floor. It was even more beautiful on the inside. The fort was fully enclosed from the elements, with the trunk of the tree running smack dab through the middle of the floor and up through the roof. A few feet up toward the ceiling was another level, almost like a loft. There were pegs nailed into the trunk so you could climb up there. And there was even another little hatch in the loft itself that led to the roof, perfect for a periscope or a squirt-gun lookout post.

I ran my fingers over the fresh varnish on the walls and took it all in for a minute. This was a better Christmas gift than I'd ever hoped for. Better than a trip to Disney World, better than a Cubs' World Series, better than even a Nintendo. Way better. I couldn't believe it.

By the time I looked down into the yard below, my family was already standing there watching me. My dad had his hands in his coat pockets. My mom held Lizzy in her arms. I could tell they'd been there for a few minutes.

"Wow-ee, Jake!" Lizzy called out. "Mom, can I go up there?"

"You have to ask your brother, Lizzy."

"Just let him be," said my dad. "It's his fort."

"Did you see this, Mom?" I yelled down. "It's from Santa!"

"Yeah, looks pretty neat, Jake! Maybe you should ask Santa to build us a new kitchen next year." She smiled at my dad.

I was hardly paying attention. "It's got a trap door, Dad!"

"Yeah, I see that. Careful by those shutters, the paint still looks wet."

"Why don't I go get the camera, John?"

"Nah. You two should go inside. It's getting cold."

My mom set Lizzy down and held her hand. She gave my dad a kiss on the cheek and patted his chest. "Come on, Lizzy, let's go back inside, it's freezing out here."

My dad walked across the yard in the snow and stood below the rope ladder. "Mind if I come up there to check it out, Jake?"

"Sure, come on up."

He climbed up through the hatch and swung his legs up with precision. "You know," he said, "if we got a big enough basket and maybe some pulleys, I bet we could rig up an elevator to bring Elwood up here."

"You think?"

"Yeah, you'd have to help me, though."

"Okay."

He walked around the fort for a minute, touching the walls and checking the strength of the pegs on the trunk. I'd never seen him like this before. He was calm and open, like he was out for a Sunday drive without a car on the road. He put his hands on the windowsill and took a deep breath.

"You smell that, Jake?"

"Fresh air?"

"That's right. Smells good, doesn't it?"

I nodded and peered out the window next to him. "It's just like in Swiss Family Robinson."

"Yeah, I guess it is. You'll have to keep a lookout for pirates."

I laughed. "Maybe we could bring the movie up to Grandma's and watch it while we're up there."

"Okay," he said, hardly able to contain his smile. "Sounds like a plan. Come on. Let's get going. It's getting cold and I don't want to hit the traffic."

I followed him to the ladder as he climbed down. It was only then that I noticed the smudges of paint on the collar of his coat, red paint, just like the kind on the shutters. My nine-year-old mind slowly put the pieces together.

From that moment on, I saw my dad a little differently. He was more than a guy who drove too fast and could never quite finish remodeling the kitchen. He was a magician. He was a hero. He was Santa Claus.

I climbed down the ladder to where he was waiting for me on the ground. He grabbed me by the waist and slung me over his shoulder. As he carried me back toward the house through the snow, I looked back at the fort, still lit up by the floodlights. Peacefully, my mind unfolded all the tree-fort adventures that undoubtedly lay ahead. Ghost-story campouts by flashlight, weeklong snowball battles, and round-the-clock sky gazing for Soviet spy planes.

"Hey, Dad?"

"Yeah?"

"Merry Christmas."

"Merry Christmas, Jake."