Per tradition, we are in Canada celebrating Christmas, Boxing Day, and Kosiorness.  As you know, my husband’s family lives in the rural village of Fillmore, Saskatchewan.  Kyle’s dad and youngest brother live in town, and his middle brother lives on their grandparents’ former homestead.  It’s less than a mile on paved and gravel roads from my father-in-law’s house on Main Street to the Middle Kosiors’, and if you stand on one leg and squint your left eye you can basically see the houses from living room window to living room window.  Kyle and I are in our eighteenth year of marriage, and I’ve traveled the Kosior-to-Kosior route, like, a LOT of times.  A.Lot.Of.Times.  A lot.  Of times.

It’s important that you understand that I have been to Fillmore and traveled the Kosior-to-Kosior route A LOT OF TIMES, including many journeys on foot and in snowstorms/the dead of night/other less-than-ideal visual situations because, thirty minutes ago, I got lost.

Today is Boxing Day in Canada.  As has been the case for every single Boxing Day we’ve spent in Fillmore since the Middle Kosiors moved to the farm ten years ago, my sister-in-law hosted brunch at their house.  Twelve wasn’t feeling well, and so we decided that Kyle would go eat, and then come back and swap places with me so I could do the same.

“Remember,” Kyle, my husband of eighteen years who is well-aware of my absolute inability to geographically place myself in this universe, said as I zipped up my coat, “Out past the health center, and turn left.”

“Yes,” I said.  “By the cemetery.”

“Across the road from the cemetery,” he said, a little nervous.

“Yes, I know,” I said, more than a bit annoyed at getting directions to the Middle Kosiors’ – and, before that, the Elder Kosiors’ – house.  “I’ll be fine.”

Five minutes later, after an absolutely gloriously sunny toodle over with the windows down, I pulled into the house.  I had raisin caramel rolls and pepper and tomato egg bake and coffee with maple syrup something-or-other (Canada), and then I watched the World Juniors (Canada) for a bit before Kyle drove up in his dad’s truck and I decided I was going to walk back to Kyle’s dad’s house to get some of that sunshine, warm weather, and Canada directly into my bones.

“It’s a twelve-minute walk,” my sister-in-law said as I zipped back up my coat.

“If I’m not back in fifteen, come and find me,” I joked.

The Middle Kosiors have a giant sweet potato of a golden retriever named Sako, and when I stepped out onto the driveway, Sako came to say hello.

“Hello, Sako,” I said, patting him on the head. I took a few steps forward, and Sako followed.

“You stay here, Sako,” I said, patting him again. Sako looked at the house, looked at me, made a face similar to the one Kyle had made when I left his dad’s earlier that morning, and circled my legs. I walked up the laneway to the corner, Sako in tow.

“Go back home, Sako,” I said, stopping at the stop sign. Across the road was the cemetery.

I turned left.

Again, Sako looked at the house. He looked at me, he looked at the house, he looked at the road, and then he followed me.

“Okay, come along,” I said.

We walked together down the gravel road.  In the distance, the prairie spread out like a golden blanket.

(Later, after I had been rescued, my brother-in-law had asked,

“So, you got to the stop sign, saw the cemetery, the health center, the grain elevator, and all of town to the right, and nothing but farmland to the left, and went left?”

“Yep,” I said.

“Town to the right, wide-open nothingness to the left,” my brother-in-law repeated.

“Yep,” I said.

“Okay,” my brother-in-law said.)

Sako and I walked. We took pleasure in the day. We took pleasure in the company. We took pleasure in the wide-open nothingness. We took pleasure in waving our hand and tail at the three cars who drove slowly past. After about fifteen minutes of said pleasure, we came to a house. Sako turned to go down the drive.

“No, no, Sako,” I said. “Grandpa’s.” I pointed forward. Sako looked back the way we came, but followed me as I proceeded down the road.

After another fifteen minutes, it came to my attention that maaaaaaaaaaaaaaayyyyyyyyyyyybe I had taken a wrong turn.  As I had only taken one turn, it meant we had walked thirty minutes in the wrong direction.

(“What made you realize you were going towards Griffin, and not Fillmore?”  Kyle later asked me.

“Nothing, really,” I said.)

Without breaking stride, I called Kyle.

“I am out looking for you,” he said.  “Where are you?”

“On the road,” I said.

“What road?”

“You know,” I gestured around me.  “This one.”

“Where is the sun?”  He asked.  It was in front of me.

Not even a minute later, Kyle drove up. Sako seemed relieved.

“Why are you still walking in the wrong direction?”  Kyle asked as I opened the door to the truck.

“I’m out for exercise, and getting it,” I said.

“Did you have a plan to turn around?”  He asked.

“I probably would have made a plan to turn around if you hadn’t answered,” I said.

“Okay,” he said, after a bit.

“How did you know to come and look for me?” I asked.

“We’ve been married a long time, Amanda,” he said. ”I started looking for you fifteen minutes after you left.”

Kyle pulled onto the parking pad at my father-in-law’s house.

“I never did finish my walk,” I said to Kyle.  “I’m going to walk to the store.”

The store, by the by, is about five buildings down from my father-in-law’s house on the same side of the street.

“Sure,” Kyle said.  “But I’d better get you a flare, just in case.”

“Ho ho,” I said, as I unzipped my jacket to let the rest of the day in.

(P.S. I made it back from the store on my own.)

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As luck would have it, I took a photo as Sako and I prepared to turn left out of the Middle Kosiors’ yard. It is above.

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North Dakota Today was a re-run this week, but last week on North Dakota Today we talked about Department 701 and Lefse.  Check it out, and please send me your nice stories and people for future episodes!  (Valley News Live)

The White Earth community is so supportive of 12-year-old Jayme Littlewolf’s newfound piano abilities that they came together to buy him an instrument of his very own. (Grand Forks Herald)

North Dakota got quite the ice storm on Christmas – so much ice, in fact, that a guy named Frank was able to ice skate the streets of Bismarck. (Facebook)

You know how there’s a national “Day” calendar that identifies things like, “National Donut Day” and the like?  Well, the guy who makes it made this clever movie poster and poem in honor of the ice storm. (Facebook)

It wouldn’t be Christmas in North Dakota without a story about a milkmaid. (Fargo Forum)

Grand Forks’ Whitney Berry reimagined a much-loved poem to celebrate the season. (Facebook)

Also as a reminder, Kyle and his friends, Corey and Kelly, have a podcast called North Dakota After Dark where they talk about youth hockey in North Dakota.  The latest episode is up and it’s with our two-time hockey manager, Jeremy Swanson.  Check it out. (North Dakota After Dark)

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