As a boy, I began looking forward to Christmas vacation in early September, about the time Mr. Kowalski started handing out those math assignments. By the time December arrived, my parents were whispering more than usual and I was wondering what magical things they had in store. There was little in the way of extra money, so one of those magical traditions was the making of colourful candles we would sell door to door, hoping to earn enough to buy gifts. Not all of the traditions were welcome. Sometimes my parents enjoyed travelling to visit relatives and friends. They had a highly sophisticated method of choosing whom we would visit, which involved the laying of a map of Canada on the floor and the tossing of relatives' pictures in the air. Whoever had their picture land closest to their hometown would receive a complementary weekend visit from the Callaways. Sometimes we'd end up in Carstairs, Alberta, and sometimes in Loon Lake, Saskatchewan. As I recall, my father never used a map, he went on faith. I always felt like the Wise Men must have felt, heading off on those trips.