‘A Christmas I’ll never forget’

For Carol Shurtleff and her two sons, Cody and Kevin, it will be remembered as the year they spent Christmas Eve in their car, stranded on Interstate 35, only a few miles from Norman, which was their destination. Those few miles made all the difference, though. They simply couldn’t get any closer.

Shurtleff and her sons were on their way to spend Christmas with Shurtleff’s sister, Lynette Lobban, who lives in Norman. When the blizzard hit, she was about halfway to Norman.

She said she slowed at times to almost 10 miles an hour, but she kept driving, until about two miles from Norman, when all traffic came to a standstill. She and her sons huddled under blankets and slept. At times, she started the car to reheat it. In between, they napped, ate the Christmas cookies they were bringing to her sister and, believe it or not, laughed a lot.

"It really wasn’t that bad,” Shurtleff said. "We had each other. We could see other people in their cars in the same situation. We never panicked.”

Around midnight, traffic began moving again as several men in trucks, being Good Samaritans, went from car to car cleaning ice off windshields and getting vehicles unstuck and on the move again. Unfortunately, Shurtleff said, even though traffic moved and she made it to Norman, she couldn’t exit at Norman. All exits were snow-clogged and closed.

A Highway Patrol trooper directed her to the Moore Public Library where the family spent the remainder of the night sleeping in chairs. By 9 a.m., they were able to leave the shelter, return to Norman and arrive at their destination.

"It’s a Christmas I’ll never forget, for sure,” she said.

For me, it was the first Christmas Eve and Christmas morning that I ever spent completely by myself. Well, I had my two cats and my dog.

And, by mid-afternoon on Christmas day, some friends — including Lobban and one of her daughters — showed up and helped me shovel my car out. They only live four blocks away so I was able to go to their house for a late Christmas dinner and some holiday cheer with them and the Shurtleff family.

Like Shurtleff, I’ll always remember it as the Christmas of the blizzard.

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