The True Christmas Miracle

Periwinkle Chronicles, tales of the citizens of Periwinkle [because all the other colors were already taken] County:

The Rev. Dr. Randall Nathan, (Retard), which is how they pronounce retired in Periwinkle County, or at least that’s what they tell him, was in his usual booth at the Good to the Last Trope Coffee House and Poetry Recycling Center with The Complete Love Poems of Herman Cain on the table in front of him, to keep anyone from sitting with him, lest he lose points in the Hermudgeon of the Year competition, hermudgeon being a conflation of hermit and curmudgeon, when three-year-old Clara Wembley came in and slipped into the booth across from him.

“Why do you have a mullet haircut, Clara?” asked Randall.

“Mommy took a nap,” said Clara. “I gave Shingles an even better do. Now he looks like a candidate for president.”

Clara still has not forgiven Shingles the dog for stealing her blankie on Christmas eve of 2009.

“Don’t let the SPCA find out. Speaking of your mother, Clara, where is she?”

“She said if she came in, you’d find some excuse why you couldn’t stay. This way you have to watch me ‘til she gets back from The Methodist Women & Ladies Xmas Tea.”

“I think you should say Christmas instead of Xmas, Clara.”

“No, Mommy says it’s Xmas because X is the unknown quantity and that’s the number of times Bessie Bandervilt will tell somebody that she’s smarter than everybody else because she never got a husband. They have a wading pool about it.”

“I suspect that’s a betting pool, Clara, but right now we need to decide what you’re going to do while you don’t bother me.”

“Don’t you have one of those wooden things… what do you call them…?

“Toys, Clara. They were what children played with before EDs,” said Randall Nathan, who is opposed to anything electrical unless coffee results from it.

“Oh, yeah. Mommy says Daddy’s got a ED. That’s why he has to see Alice.”

“I think she means something other than Electronic Device, Clara.”

He pulled a bb thing out of his child entertainment pocket. It was Santa Claus, with bb holes on the top of his hat, and for his eyes and ears, and his belly button, and for each thumb and each big toe.

“Oh, great, a bb king,” said Clara. “But wouldn’t it have better cemetery if there were places for a couple of those silver bbs between his legs?”

“I think you mean symmetry, Clara, and I choose not to comment on the rest of your question. Get to work.”

Clara dutifully began to roll the bbs in an attempt to get them all into the holes.

Just then Libby Leftoveer came in and slipped into the booth across from them.

“I just got back from Occupy Wal-Mart,” said Libby. “It was awful. Nobody noticed us. We fit right in. They thought we were there for the 10% Off Price Signs sale.”

“There’s a thin line between Wal-Mart and anarchy,” observed Randall.

Immediately, as the Gospel writer Mark would say, Gretchen Retched of the Faux News station entered and came to the booth and stood over them, at parade rest.

“I thought I’d find you here, making war on Christmas,” said Gretchen Retched. “I’ll bet you’re corrupting the mind of that little girl. She should be working the bb thing with the 10 Commandments.”

“What do the 10 Commandments have to do with Christmas?” asked Randall. “Santa is actually a more prevalent Christmas symbol.”

“Christmas isn’t religious at all,” retorted Libby to Gretchen. “It’s just a pagan holiday devoted to economic warlords.”

“You’re wrong,” cried Gretchen. “The 10 Commandments and Christmas have been the basic foundation of this great nation from the beginning.”

“Actually,” said Randall, “the pilgrims banned Christmas, so it was not foundational to our nation, Gretchen. And while Christmas was co-opted by Christians from a pagan holiday, Libby, and it has become a commercial bonanza, it is thoroughly religious for those who have ears to hear the message of peace on earth, good will to people.”

“I guess we’ll have to pay more attention to the facts,” said Gretchen Retched and Libby Leftoveer.

“It’s a Christmas miracle,” shouted Clara.

“Yes, Clara,” said Randall Nathan. “You have witnessed the triumph of truth over…”

Then he looked down at the BB Claus in her hands. Every bb was in place.

***
The similarity between the activities in Periwinkle County and events in other places is rarely coincidental.

[“Christ in Winter,” Reflections On Faith For People In The Winter Of Their Years, can be found at http://christinwinter.blogspot.com/]

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