A Roadkill Christmas

The family gathers around in wonder

I knew something was unusual about this man when he sent me tarnished brass hearts and a baby bootie in the mail.  A friend had set us up to write to each other sixteen years ago, saying, “You’d be good friends if nothing else.” Well, we were building that friendship, but there were things I just didn’t understand about him… like a package of odd, scuffed-up items in the mail.

Turns out my husband is into roadkill.

Not roadkill like dead animals. The term “roadkill” has, long before I came on the scene, referred to items he finds when out running. In his funny man-way, sending me things he found discarded along the road was kind of like your happy dog that comes trotting in the door with a chewed up shoe in his mouth, wagging his tail as if to say, “Hey, look what I found! I thought of you!”

Through the years since I opened the packages with the brass hearts and baby bootie, many things have gotten dragged home to show me before being discarded properly—most of them—in the trash bin. A few things are deemed important enough to save. Or washed and put into the charity box to take to our church’s community services center. Husband is the king of roadkill on our morning walks, suddenly veering off to pick up some shiny object or other along the roadsides, closely inspecting various unusual items, and keeping his eye peeled for things discarded in the bushes by Graffiti Gulch, our favorite dirt road right here in the suburbs an hour outside Los Angeles.

A couple of years ago while out on our morning walk we hatched up an idea for challenging our adult kids for the next Christmas. I confess, it came from me in response to a less-than-stellar white elephant exchange a few days before. Instead of the white elephant exchange as the family grows ever larger, I suggested with no seriousness whatsoever, how about a roadkill exchange? Ours is a family that “notices things,” unlike my family of origin. What if we all collected our roadkill and then exchanged boxes of it at Christmas and remarked upon each other’s discoveries? Wouldn’t that be a kick? 

Well, Husband thought it to be a grand idea, and we launched it with the rest of the family.  I suppose you’d have to know our family to understand the excitement, brief though it might be, in planning a Roadkill Christmas.

And so, for Christmas 2014, the big roadkill giveaway took place. The grandkids watched to see who would pick which box (their presents were more conventional). My contribution was pretty unremarkable—pennies, a baby jacket, a packet of baseball cards, a container of pogs.  I don’t recall who chose my box from the stack of wrapped things. But there remained the pièce de résistance:  Husband’s huge box of roadkill. 

Our adult kids eyed it suspiciously. And it was the intrepid son who decided to risk his dad’s contribution. 

Ah, the surprises in that box of roadkill! Have I mentioned that this is a man who Notices Things? The box held golf balls, a couple of baseballs, a wire basket, a jacket (washed), a police officer head from a ceramic cookie jar—who MAKES these?--, a pink crown, an empty medical marijuana bottle or two, lots of coins, a $5 bill, a stack of CDs of Indian music not good enough to be used by Bollywood, a Hannah Montana plastic handheld microphone, and an old amplifier. We were all remarking on these items, laughter punctuating the air as jokes flew and each new item emerged. I was watching to see if Son was disappointed or pleased. At very least, he was intrigued. He has a mind like his father's.

And then Husband announced, “Wait. There’s one more thing.” He stepped outside the front door and brought back in the Thing That Could Not Be Wrapped,  [Drumroll, please]: a chainsaw.  

Seriously, who discards a perfectly good, small chainsaw along Graffiti Gulch? But someone had. It had lain there for several days, so Husband ascertained that someone was not coming back to reclaim it. Son was seriously impressed, and everyone else obligingly piled on with expressions of envy.

“One man’s trash is another man’s treasure.” 

Yep. A Roadkill Christmas reminded us of that. And sometimes the treasure is simply the intrigue of what gets found, and the satisfaction of knowing that our world is a little tidier place.