Christmas of the Trolls

Memories of a cardboard box home & butt-ugly trolls

When I was little, I wanted a troll.

It wasn’t just me; my brothers wanted trolls too. Only problem was our Mom hated trolls; she thought they were ugly and pointless.

One Christmas, though, our mother relented.

That morning, my brothers and I rushed excitedly to the living room to see what Santa had left. And what did we find?

A large cardboard box. 

Huh? 

Perplexed, we investigated. We could see that on one side of the box, our mother had cut out windows and pasted on little shutters. Inside each window was a minuscule candlestick made out of construction paper with a little flicker of flame at the top. A wreath hung at a front door that actually opened and closed. Aha … a home of some sort.

The other side of the box was completely cut away, like a doll house – so you could see the rooms. She’d built a second floor out of a box flap, and taped in a set of paper stairs leading up. Every room was outfitted with furniture, ingeniously manufactured out of things like fabric scraps, match sticks, thread spools, and little odds and ends from around our real house.

In the “living room,” a construction-paper Christmas tree decorated with tiny beads at the end of each limb and a tin-foil star at the top, stood in the corner. A dozen teeny troll “presents,” painstakingly wrapped in sparkly foil and decorated with super-tiny ribbons, were artfully arranged around the base of the tree. Hanging from the “mantle” over a faux-fireplace complete with colored-in logs and flames going up an unseen chimney, were three miniature stockings made of felt.

And in the middle of the room, squat and flat-footed, stood three trolls. 

They, too, bore our mother’s handiwork. Yes, they still had their electrified Don King hairdos, but they also had tiny elf-like hats made out of green felt pinned into the massive frizz atop their heads and matching elf-like shoes on their feet. She’d even made red and green vests to adorn their naked troll bodies. 

We all immediately scooped up our trolls and oohed and ahhhed over the troll house. We didn't even notice there were few (if any) other presents to be had that challenging year, but it didn't matter.  The trolls were prized possessions and we each were also given red stockings stuffed with cookies, chewing gum and small trinkets. 

The troll house got a lot of play, but kids being kids, I’m sure it eventually was torn to bits (probably during a troll war of some sort) and eventually tossed out.

But what didn’t get tossed out was the memory.

Throughout the years, usually at Christmas, when my brothers and I were home at the same time, we would gather in my mom's kitchen, getting in her way as she cooked, trading jokes and catching up on each other's lives, until inevitably, one of us kids would ask, “Hey, remember the troll house that Mom made?”

From there, stories of our childhood would cascade from our memories, reminding us freshly of things long forgotten: how my brother used to hide my Raggedy Ann, how another brother, after my parents' divorce, had stolen a neighbor’s Easter eggs to secretly share with me because we didn't have any of our own; how we used to run after the ice cream truck with the other neighborhood kids; and of course, to hear my brothers tell it, how spoiled their little sister was.

That long ago Christmas, when my mom thought she was making a beautiful home for what she considered butt-ugly trolls, she really was making a home for our memories. 

Memories of a wonderfully creative and special mother. Memories of being a family together long before we went on to have our own. Memories of tough times made happy by real love. 

When we ask each other, “Remember the troll house?” What we’re really asking is, “Remember our family?” 

And the answer is, yes. Yes, we do.

Wishing you all a fantastic, safe, and wonderful Christmas Day and an even happier 2021-to-come!