Before I left for Ohio, I parked on Main Street and hurried over to drop my water bill payment in the outdoor slot. However, they had just opened and so I went in – the only early bird client on the foggy morning that had delayed my departure.

And for about 30 minutes, the water bill lady and I “kept Christmas well” to cite Dickens. She told me about the gathering planned for her house on Christmas Eve and her young granddaughter and “reindeer food” and the young lass’s intense worry that the reindeer wouldn’t be able to find it.

We talked of bubble lights and her son, who likes to hunt, giving out presents in his hunter’s cap with the ear flaps. We talked of making fancy cookies, something she does and my mother did, but I flunked in elf school. We talked of family traditions and magic and all sorts of good cheer things. And her smile was so sincere and warm as she shared with me – it kept me smiling through the fog and rain to Dayton.

Had there not been mist and fog, I would have been too early to enter the lobby; I would have dropped the bill in the slot – and I would have lost out on some of the cheer of the season.