Christmas Disappointments

Tommy Houchins got out of prison yesterday. He was scheduled to be released Dec. 23, so he could be home in Memphjus, the seat of Periwinkle County, for Christmas. The warden, however, "lost" his papers. Tommy is a tough guy, and the warden doesn't like tough guys, especially tough guys who won't spy for him.

Tommy's sister talked her husband into driving to the pen to bring Tommy home. Dwayne doesn't like Tommy, and Tommy doesn't like Dwayne, but they both like Laraine. Of course, Dwayne showed up on Dec. 23, and Tommy wasn't "ready," so naturally Dwayne went home without him. Tommy couldn't blame him for that. No use both of them missing Christmas.

Now he's sitting in a bus station, waiting out a storm, wondering if there will be any persimmon pudding left by the time he gets home. He's also thinking about what the old preacher said, about Christmas never being over because of the disappointments. What was it? The old preacher came to visit him every month. His December visit, they talked about Christmas. The old preacher said his mother-in-law always said, come about supper time on Christmas day, "There's nothing as over as Christmas."

He said he understood how that was true for a woman. Women spent so much time getting gifts, and wrapping them, and planning meals, and cooking them, and getting out the good silver, and polishing it... then suddenly, there was nothing but torn wrappings and turkey bones and dirty dishes. And the disappointment...

That's what keeps Christmas coming back, he said, the disappointments. Everyone has a story about the pony they didn't get. She asked for a doll, and got it, but it was the wrong one. He wanted a basketball but got rubber boots. They asked for world peace and got the Taliban instead.

Halloween doesn't keep coming back. Neither does Easter. Not even Arbor Day. Nobody remembers that they got Snickers bars when they wanted Kit-Kats trick or treating. Nobody complains that they got pink peeps in their Easter basket instead of a chocolate bunny. Nobody wishes they could have planted an oak instead of a maple.

That's why Christmas is never really over, why it keeps coming back, the disappointments with the gifts, just like everybody is always disappointed with what God gives them, especially the Christmas gift, that Jesus. Despite how people talk about him, Jesus didn't change anything. People still die. Kids still get cancer. People lose their jobs and have to live on the streets. You do something nice for someone and they hold it against you. Jesus saves us from our sins they say, so why do we keep on sinning?

We want God to give us good presents, like an end to hunger, and no more pollution, no more kids dying, no more murder and rape and greed and talk radio and computers that go kaput in the night. Instead God gives us a little baby, some little life we have to take care of.

It's the disappointments with the gifts that keeps us coming back for Christmas, seeing if maybe we'll finally get what we want.

Tommy is disappointed, but he's sitting there in that bus station, waiting out the storm, knowing there's nothing in Periwinkle County for him anymore, but there's nothing anyplace either, so he's going home. When he gets there, it will be Christmas.