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Monday, November 22, 2004

One Too Many Santas

There we were snowbound somewhere in the heartlands, over fifty friends and relatives gathered for the holidays all trapped together in the old family homestead by the worst blizzard in twenty years. The snowstorm had been raging for the past twelve hours and showed no sign of stopping anytime in the foreseeable future. The wind howled and shrieked like some huge wounded beast that was determined to beat down the door and rage through the house. Peering through the frost covered windows we could see the swirling waves of wind blown snow was still falling thicker than the hair on dear old Aunt Polly's puckered upper lip.

The stampeding herd of shrieking sugar-maddened children ran from one room to another. They swept from one room to another in a nonstop migration to and fro. The thunderous sound of their passage rocked the old overheated farmhouse. They clamored to see Santa and would not be denied. The unruly mob of young ones almost overturned the Christmas tree as they franticly clawed for position to get closest to where jolly Santa would settle down and hold court after he parked his snowmobile carrying a big bag of loot for all the girls and boys.

The shell-shocked adults quickly sought much needed refuge in quieter rooms of the farmhouse. They hid behind doors barricaded against the siege waged by the horde of youngsters overrunning the living room. Occasionally one of the braver adults would stick their head out to check to see if there were still a few unbroken chairs to sit on when time came to watch Santa passing out of the gifts later that night.

The night air suddenly was filled with the flashing of blue lights and the shrill earsplitting howl of a fire-truck siren. Some of the neighborhood volunteer firemen hell-bent on rescue had driven their aged four-wheel drive truck into a huge snow bank. They swore and spun the tires as they rocked the truck back and forth. They only managed to bury the truck deeper into the mountain of dirty packed snow pushed up over the past twenty-four hours by countless snowplows. In the desperate attempt to keep two lanes of traffic crawling along on their way to home and kin these heroes had become stranded.

I opened the door to see what was the matter and they staggered into the house begging for help to shovel a path out of the driveway. Once inside the shelter of the house these three stranded snowmen thawed out, we saw that it was Bill Le Blanc, Otis Blake, and Charlie Moffett. These three drunken reprobates were some of my old man's drinking buddies and partners in crime. They were all long-term denizens of the local bar down the road, so it was no surprise that they would seek shelter under our snow-covered roof.

Our new visitors had been tipping the bottle all evening to ward off the bitter chill of the frigid arctic blasts from out of the north. The wind whipping down Lake Michigan was like a giant straight razor that could cut you to the bone. The thermometer showed a temperature of minus 5 degrees, and was plummeting as we watched. Drastic times call for drastic measures, and massive amounts of antifreeze was just what the doctor ordered.

After more than a few tastes of Christmas cheer, they were three sheets to the wind, telling off-color jokes, leering waving mistletoe over their heads, puckering up their lips at any lady passing by and singing bawdy carols. The vote was unanimous; it was going to be one hell of a Christmas Eve.

Seductive aromas of home cooking called to the men like a siren's song. The scent luring us into the busy kitchen like moths attracted to a flame. We had been hungrily circling the growing pile of temptation that filled the kitchen table. A ravenous pack of men folk, drooling over the cookies, candies, rolls and slices of turkey, ham and assorted cheeses. It was not our fault that the ladies had outdone themselves this year. We could no longer wait to sample some of the morsels that had been prepared with such loving care for the upcoming holiday feast.

The womenfolk were on the verge of throwing all the unrepentant male food thieves out of the kitchen. Our constant raids on whatever dish that popped out of the oven, or was left unguarded on top of the stove quickly spent even their usual vast sea of patience. We would smile at them and try flattery to postpone the inevitable exile to the chaos of the child-packed living room. We were shooed out of the kitchen at broom point. The law had been laid down and we were told that we had to wait for supper just like everybody else. We grumbled, quickly snatching whatever was at hand and fled the scene like thieves in the night bent on evading capture and punishment at the hands of the law.

We exited the kitchen with whatever booty we could grab on our way out, stuffing food into our mouths to avoid detection. As we entered the dining room there was a loud banging at the door. This was followed by loud laughter and the sound of frantic tapping on the glass storm door. Someone had the presence of mind to look at the clock and notice that Santa was running late this year. Through the window we spied the flash of a red cap and the white of what was obviously a fake beard. Next we all heard a loud whoop and a bone jarring crash as Santa toppled and began swearing like a drunken sailor.

We looked at each other passing the buck on who was going to go answer the door and help get the old boy back on his feet. It was quickly if not quietly decided that we all might be needed to get the job done, because our Santa was a three hundred pound biker, and none of us were feeling particularly frisky enough to do it on our own.

Throwing open the door we grabbed the fallen Santa, and hurriedly scooped him up. We got him back on his feet. We wasted no time pulling him into the safety of the house. Everyone in the dining room looked closer at Santa, our jaws dropped and then looked at each other in dismay. Even the most oblivious of our group could see that something was wrong, seriously wrong!

This was not our Santa! First thing you could see was that his beard was about to fall off and was only held on with some old Band-Aids. This gaping pretender stood at least a foot shorter and at over one hundred pounds lighter than our Santa. Not to mention that this one smelled badly. The stench was a mix of aged sweat, stale beer and cheap cigars. The less intoxicated members of the male hunting party noticed one more thing that was cause for concern.

Instead of the huge bag filled to the top with brightly wrapped presents that we expected he had a dirty beat up burlap potato sack slung over his shoulder. The sack he carried was doubly surprising to us all because it was moving on it's own accord. We could hear a muffled hissing and growling coming from inside it. The sack bounced on his scrawny shoulder with a life of its own. It was all too plain to see that something alive was trapped in there, it was not wasting time waiting to be let loose. Whatever Santa had in his bag was desperately trying to escape.

He stood there wobbling back and forth, his red suit hung off him like a rumpled dirty sack. He grinned and yelled "Merry Chrissssssmuush!" spun around and fell flat on his face in the middle of the group who filled the dining room. The potato sack tumbled in flight and bounced off the wall into the corner spilling a live hissing enraged opossum onto the floor. The frightened beast snarled and bared its teeth at the onlookers, and then promptly rolled into a ball and played dead. Santa crawled slowly on his hands and knees over to where it landed, picked the bag up and grabbed the opossum by the tail and threw it back into the sack.

The band-aids holding his tattered beard to his face had met their match. The dirty white clump of whiskers fell to the floor. We could see that this uninvited impersonator was none other than old Tom Morris, the town drunk. The children screamed and ran away, hiding behind chairs and the sofa in the living room. Tom was not deterred by the general panic he caused. He belched loudly and finally regained his shaky footing. "Damn if that didn't spoil my surprise!" he slurred, wiping the drool from his mouth on a grimy threadbare sleeve. "Anybody got a drink for good old Santa? It's hard thirsty work bringing you damn little kiddies a bunch of Christmas joy. Bessy got stuck in a snow drift when I was heading home from the Waterford Inn and your place was on the way."

Tom was a neighborhood legend around our town. He was part bogeyman, part brunt of every joke told at the tavern in the village of Waterford. People whispered and offered their sympathy to his long-suffering wife. The common opinion being that he was not too bright, lazy and shiftless. The one true love of his life was not his wife. That was Bessy his rusty second-hand riding lawn mower that he rode almost year round. It can't be said that the loamier returned his affections. Tom had lost 3 toes on each foot one summer when he ran over an embankment and fed his feet to the hungry metal mistress of lawn care.

Suddenly the roar of a snowmobile filled the air. Squeals rang out from the living room as the kids spotted the guy in the red suit through the frosted windows. We all rushed to the door to welcome Santa. " Ho Ho Ho!" Santa bellowed as he strode through the door carrying a huge bag of brightly colored gift boxes and toys. "Ho Ho Ho?" Santa looked at the pretender and frowned. " Who is that guy dressed like me?" he asked. We explained the situation to our mystified Santa, and asked if he could give Tom a ride home because his wife might want him home almost as much as we wanted him there.

Santa winked at the young ones and grabbed Tom by the scruff of his neck. He merrily shouted to the mob of children who threatened to swarm over him like a nest of ants that had been disturbed. "Santa will be right back children! I want you all to behave and stay out of my bag. I have to deliver a special present to Mrs. Morris." He picked Tom up by the seat of his pants. He then threw the defrocked pretender over his shoulder, and carried him out the door. We all breathed a collective sigh of relief as they rode off on Santa's shiny red snowmobile into the snowy night.

Santa quickly returned and began passing out presents to all the waiting girls and boys. At last the youngsters were placated. The parents got them settled in to bed and eventually they fell asleep. The men folk finally got fed and drinks did flow. We were all on our best behavior and no fights broke out. After midnight the snow stopped. Later the sky cleared revealing a full moon. The snowy yard brightly sparkled in the moonlight. And all was right with the world on the night we were visited by one too many Santas.

Friday, September 24, 2004

Poem of the Moment

Golden Autumn Splendor

The branches sway, weaving patterns
Beckoning the eye to join their dance
They reach to the deep blue heavens
I sit and watch them, rapt, entranced

So full the sky, so gold the maples
So spicy sweet the cool crisp air
Sprays of green, brown, and crimson
Festive dress for an Autumn Faire

The pale golden threads of the sunlight
spun round the boughs, in crazy designs
a spider web of golden beams capture
the forest spirit,  speaks of the divine

The gold of your heart is so much purer
Than these Autumn leaves could ever be
Your graceful movement, rings much truer
than this wild forest ballet to me 

October 17, 1999

Thursday, September 23, 2004

The Secret World of Childern: Rites of Initiation

When I was young I would often stay with my father's parents on weekends and during the summer. They lived near the beach in a two story three apartment flat tucked behind a bar and restaurant that was owned by a German matriarch named Bertha. She was an amazing woman with the physical and mental strength and energy of ten men. She made her own sauerkraut in huge ceramic vats and would try to marry me off to her granddaughter though we were both only twelve.

My best friend was one of Bertha's grandsons. John was a clever sharp tongued prankster with an air of detached superiority for those who did not meet his standards of intelligence and quickness. John won the leadership of the pack of boys who lived in the neighborhood by his sheer force of personality and fast talking. He always had a new scheme to break the summer boredom that would creep in sometime in July.

When I first met him we sized each other up and decided we could hang out together. One day while we were returning from taking practice shots at empty bottles with out BB-guns John pointed at something in front of us. There we saw a strange object on the ground half hidden near the walk to my grandparent's place. I picked it up and discovered it was an old bleached out bone wrapped in paper. I removed the paper, unrolled it and saw something was written on it. In a shaky uneven hand were the words "I know where you live kid and you are going to die!"

I showed the tattered piece of paper to John. He looked at me with a wide eyed amazed stare, that turned to shock at what he read. He looked at me with concern and said, "Oh no! not again! I thought the police caught him last year. There was a crazed killer named Gus Johnson who kidnapped and killed three kids last summer. He stole their eyes when he was through. They caught him in the old abandoned slaughterhouse out in the woods about a half mile from here. The police searched the slaughterhouse and discovered that he had been staying there. This was where he took the missing kids to kill them it was said that they found the eyes in a pickle jar on a shelf. There were rumors that they did not recover all of the eyes, some say he was eating them like they were pickled eggs in the bar."

I looked at John with much skepticism and told him that I wanted to go there to see if there was any sign he had returned. I would not tell him that I thought he was full of BS until I found out if there was really an old abandoned slaughterhouse deep in the woods. John nervously agreed to show it to me as long as we stayed quiet and on guard in case we needed to escape from a madman bent on turning us both into dinner.

We set off down the path that led to the clay pit. Then we turned east and began to wind our way through the woods. We walked for what seemed like an hour. Then after skirting spiny thickets of blackberry bushes the object of our search came into view. There it was, buried deep in the brooding woods. We silently approached an old weather beaten wooden building overgrown with vines and shrouded by young oak saplings. The ground was littered with old animal bones and rusted parts of broken farm machinery.

John took the lead and crept up to an old set of double doors that hung askew on their hinges. We peered into the gloomy ramshackle interior of the place. bones were strewn across the dirty wooden floor. A block and tackle hung from a beam the chain swinging in the breeze. On a wall were old knives and an old axe was buried into an old wooden chopping block. In the far corner was a pile of dirty rags that looked like someone had been using as bedding.

Silently we looked around, shocked and stunned by the scene around us. John looked startled and grabbed my arm. "Keep quiet... Did you hear that?" he whispered. " What did you hear?" I whispered back. the fear rising inside as I expected to see Gus crash through the woods and surprise us both inside his lair. John froze and then said in a low voice filled with fear. "Quick he's coming! Run!"

We ran for our lives, jumping ditches and streams, painfully crashing through berry bushes until we were out of the woods. We did not stop running till we collapsed breathlessly in the basement recreation room in John's basement. Secure in our stronghold we began to plan on how we should handle the return of Mad Gus, the eyeball eater. We plotted different ways of catching him so we could collect the reward. Our war counsel lasted until it was time for me to get back to my grandparent's home.

The next morning I awoke and had breakfast with my grandparents. John and I had decided it was our problem and we had to solve it by without the aid of adults. After spending a while making small talk with my grandparents I headed off to see John. I opened the door to the apartment and there on the deck laying next to the door was another bone wrapped in dirty scorched and tattered paper.

I hid the bone under my shirt and quickly slipped past John's mother on my way to the basement. John was nervously waiting for me to arrive. "Man am I glad to see you. When I got up and went outside this morning There was a bone with a note around it sitting in the grass by the steps.. I read it but had to throw it away in case my mother found it. He's after me too." he said quietly, looking to make sure nobody heard what we had to say.

As soon as I pulled the bone I had found out from under my shirt John gaped and stood back. I unrolled the note from the bone. This time there was a picture from an old newspaper that had been crudely torn out and glued to the paper. The eyes of the person in the picture had been burned out leaving charred sockets, on the note it said in the same crazy tilted printing. "I saw you two messing around my place yesterday, and I am going to do this to you tonight. See you soon. xxx Gus"

We hurriedly gathered up the bone and note and stealthily disposed of it. While we were gathering our wits John told me that tonight he was going out of town with his parents to visit family in Illinois. I would have to protect myself by staying indoors. I would stand guard, keep the door locked tonight and not let anyone into the house.

I made it home before darkness fell and secured the door. I kept a poker face while eating supper. I helped with the dishes and then played three handed cut-throat pinochle with my grandparents till they were ready for bed. I got out a new model airplane kit I had bought a few days before and began to trim and glue the parts together as I waited for them to fall asleep.

Around eleven that night I heard a thump of something tossed at the door. I turned on the porch light and scanned the lawn with a flashlight. There was nobody at the door and I took a chance by opening the door. I looked around and then down. Laying at my feet was a bone with a note on it. I grabbed it and quietly closed and relocked the door behind me. I listened to hear if I had woke anyone. the snoring from the bedroom told me that they had not heard a thing.

I took the bone into the bathroom and locked the door. Unwrapping it I read the final message. "Tonight at midnight prepare to meet your doom. I will get you and then your little buddy is next!" I left the bathroom and hid the bone and note in the garbage can. Then I prepared to make my last stand.

I went into the kitchen and dug in the knife drawer till I found a large sturdy homemade knife that had once been a lawnmower blade. I set it on the stove next to the door so I could grab it with my right hand when the moment came. I practiced the motion of opening the door with my left hand while grabbing the knife in my right until I was satisfied that I had it right. then I returned to the dining room and waited while watching "The Wolfman" on a local late night show called Shock Theater hosted by a television ghoul named Marvin and his undead rock band the Deadbeats.

I kept one eye on the television, one on the clock as I sat at the table. I grabbed a snack and went to the bathroom. getting killed by a psycho was something I would risk, crapping my pants in the face of danger would not. The minutes crawled by slowly, until the clock read 11:59 pm. I breathed deep and quietly stepped into the kitchen.

Suddenly I heard movement outside moving closer to the building. The sound of slow lumbering footsteps climbing the stairs to the door I stood waiting behind. one hand on the knob, one hand on the handle of a foot long knife. I listened as the plodding journey ended inches away. The silence was broken by three loud sharp raps on the door.

I threw open the door and confronted the monster that had come in the night to claim me. I prepared to strike with all my strength at the heart of the beast only to see one of my grandfather's drinking cronies from the bar out front standing there as he drunkenly weaved from side to side. I slid the knife onto the stove top so he did not see it in the semidarkness and asked what on Earth was he doing beating on the door at this time of night.

He looked confused and asked where my grandfather was, and why he had sent John over to the bar to tell him my grandfather wanted to see him right away. I told him that he must be mistaken, because my grand folks had gone to bed a couple hours ago. He scratched his head and turned to leave. As he staggered away mumbling something about damn kids I heard the muffled sound of laughter around the yard. One at a time the local boys popped up and cheered.

I went downstairs into the yard and walked up to John. I looked him in the eye and told him that he had almost got old Charlie killed. John laughed and said welcome to the club I passed the bravery test unlike poor gutless Butchy who was doomed from that day forward to be a pack animal for all of us to use. I laughed and punched John in the arm as hard as I could and told him no hard feelings. We shook hands. That was the night I took my place as a honored member of the Boy's Tribe.

Tuesday, September 21, 2004

Those Wonderous Treasures of Life

You Were Born of Such Exceeding Grace.

Tuesday is a day that means a lot to me, 20 years ago I saw a new life begin in a birthing room in Chicago. The awesome mystery of birth. I had studied, practiced in class with My wife, but when the time came I wondered if I would know enough to see us through. It all began when My wife woke Me to say she was having contractions very close together.

On arrival at the hospital she refused the wheelchair they brought for her. Once inside they seperated us so I could fill out paperwork. When I got back up to where she was being checked out I found her in a very angry and agitated state. While I was gone the doctor on duty (who had a suspiciously high rate of cesarean sections to his credit) had told her the birthing room was in use and then tried to browbeat her out of using a birthing room at all. They had no idea that they were messing with the wrong people. I ordered him and the nurse out of the room then called the hospital administrator and the head of the birthing room program.

The matter was taken out of our hands. When she heard that the birthing room was not available she gave the staff the die slowly and painfully look look and shut down her contractions. She smiled a poisonous smile at the offending doctor and nurse and said, "You can wheel me down to a taxi now". It was time to go home and wait some more.

We slept wrapped in each other's arms until afternoon. Waking we ate and talked, and inside I felt we were centered and ready for anything. I was sent out for snacks and videos and we settled into waiting, knowing we would not be denied. We slept again, and then at 5:00 am it happened.

We woke in a pool of water. It was time at last. and this time she did accept the wheelchair. The doctor on duty was the husband of our birthing class nurse midwife, the birthing room was ours, and we were commited.

We were focused on the sweep of a stopwatch, walking, breathing, timing contractions. The nurses and Doctor had left the room when it all began to run it's course. We were alone waiting, and slowly our daughter's head began to crown. the wonder of knowing that a new person was here and I was the first person on Earth to see her. Even 20 years later it still brings a tear of joy to My eye and humbles Me with sheer beauty and emotional power of the moment.

The nurse midwife and doctor arrived, and things started to happen rapidly. Breathe, in... out..... suddenly Lisa threw back her head and swore at us all. "Ok so that is transition" I said to her. She centered again and began to breathe as I counted out for her. Suddenly after that last push where she threw her whole being into it our daughter was free.

A perfect new being, who looked around the room so serious and calm. After the cleaning and APGAR test I got to touch her and talk to her, watch her first small smile. All those hours I had spent speaking to her while she was inside her mother as she grew to term. I think she recognised my voice. Her tiny fingers wrapped around my finger and I sang to her soft and low. Carefully I picked her up and carried her to her waiting mother.

She took our child into her arms and kissed her. She pressed her to her full swollen breast and suckeled her for the first time. I watched the two of them together as sleep began to take them. I sat there beside them and marveled at how I had earned the right to so much beauty in my life.