Friday, December 25, 2015

Dear Santa…Sincerely, Virginia


Dear Santa,

A few years ago I overheard some kids in my class say you weren’t real. To say the least, I was shocked. I went home and asked my father if it was true. Instead of giving me a real answer, he told me to write to the local newspaper and ask them, because apparently, “If you see it in The Sun, it’s so.” So, I did. In a published response, an editor named Francis Church assured me—and millions of other children—that Santa was indeed real! “Not believe in Santa Claus!” he proclaimed. “You might as well not believe in fairies!” I was overjoyed by the reassurance, for surely an adult working in the field of journalism couldn’t lie, could he? But then something happened. After Christmas break we all came back to school and this kid named Joey kept talking about all the great presents Santa had brought him—things like a bike and a sled and a pony. A pony! For Christmas! Can you believe it? And here lies the problem. Joey was naughty all year! He pulled little girls hair. He used foul language. He picked on the smaller children. And yet Santa still brought him all of these amazing gifts. I was nice all year to everyone and all I got was a stupid doll. Now, how does the naughty boy get extravagant gifts from Santa while the nice girl doesn’t? Which got me thinking—you must not be real after all. But then why didn’t my father just say so? And why did that guy at the newspaper go through so much effort to perpetuate a lie? I mean, what kind of sick world do we live in where adults continuously lie to their children during the most formative years of their lives? And if they’re lying about something as stupid as Santa, what else are they lying to us about? Next they’ll tell me there isn’t an all powerful God in the sky who controls everything and judges us. Wait a second! As I’m writing this I’ve suddenly realized how foolish that sounds too. A guy in the sky? Fuck! They really had me there. Good one you assholes. Oh, now you want to know why I’m using foul language? Because it doesn’t matter, does it? Maybe if I use enough of it, I’ll get a motherfucking pony from some overweight pervert in a red suit that flies around with reindeer. That’ll be the day! I know you’ll never read this letter, Santa, you know, because you don’t exist, but maybe someday someone will invent a machine that allows them to share what they’re thinking with everyone else in the world and maybe some brilliant writer will share this very letter with them. Or not. Either way.

                                                                                             Sincerely,
                                                                                             Virginia


P.S. I still believe in fairies.



Thursday, December 17, 2015

The Christmas Bizarre


            
            “…and this is the ticket stub from the premier of Star Wars: The Force Awakens.” Tony held up a small square of paper.
The classroom replied with a chorus of “ooohs” and “ahhhhhhs.”
            “Was it good?” Suzie asked.
            “Of course it was good,” Tony said. “It was only the greatest movie ever! Duh!”
            “Better than Jurassic World?” Bert wanted to know.
            “Jurassic what?” Tony retorted.
            All the children in the classroom laughed.
            “Alright now,” Miss Crow said, “settle down now, settle down. Let’s thank Tony for sharing his ticket stub.”
            “Thank you Tony,” the children replied in unison.
            “Okay, Winston, it’s your turn for show and tell.”
            Winston walked to the front of the room. “I don’t have anything to show this week,” he said. “But I have something to tell you about. Over the weekend, my Uncle Leo took me to a Christmas Bizarre.”
            “You mean a bazaar,” Miss Crow corrected him. “B-A-Z-A-A-R.”
            “No. It was a bizarre. B-I-Z-A-R-R-E. As in, isn’t it bizarre that so many grown men flocked to see that children’s movie over the weekend. But I can understand why you might be confused. When my Uncle Leo told me he was taking me to a Christmas Bazaar, I was like, Lame! But the Christmas Bizarre was anything but lame. It was…well… bizarre.”
            “What was so bizarre about it?” Suzie wanted to know.
            “Everything,” Winston proclaimed. “Let’s see, there was a Santa Clause, but not like a normal Santa Clause. This one was rail thin, like a skeleton, and instead of a red suit, he was wearing thin straps of red leather and every time he said “Ho, ho ho,” he whipped a woman on all fours with a long leather strap. It looked like it hurt, but she seemed to like it. And then there were adults dressed up like furry animals, but they were wearing Santa hats. And then there was these other adults dressed up like it was the Industrial Revolution, but not the real Industrial Revolution, but an Industrial Revolution, like, in the future, and they wore Santa hats too. And then there was an elf petting zoo…”
            “What’s an elf petting zoo?” Tony asked.
            “That’s when there’s a bunch of elves trapped behind a short fence, and you can hold out pieces of candy, and they’ll come over and eat out of your hand. And then there was this woman who was wearing nothing but candy canes. And then there was this tall redhead with freckles whose body was covered in slices of white bread. I asked Uncle Leo what he was supposed to be, and he said he was a “Ginger Bread Man,” but I didn’t get it. And then there was a Christmas tree made out of humans and it sang Christmas carols but the words were all changed to dirty words we can’t say in school. And all the adults were drinking eggnog which seemed to make them very happy but when I asked for some Uncle Leo said it was adults-only eggnog. And then they put on a performance of the Christmas Story but Baby Jesus was played by a giant African-American woman who seemed very angry at the white man for changing her skin color and gender in order to control the hoards of ungrateful heathens. And then there was a mistletoe room, whatever that is, but Uncle Leo said that I wasn’t allowed inside, because inside the missile-toe room they…”
            “Alright now, Winston,” Miss Crow interrupted. “You’ve got quite the wild imagination, but I think we all know there’s no such thing as a Christmas Bizarre.”
            “But there is,” Winston insisted, “and you know there is. Because you were there. I saw you. You were on all fours, along with seven other people, and you all had antlers on your heads, and you weren’t wearing any clothing, and you were crawling around the Bizarre pulling a sleigh full of dismembered doll pieces. I wanted to say something to you, but you looked like you were having so much fun…”
            Miss Crow’s eyes lit up. “Alright now. Alright. Early recess today. Let’s go class, out to the playground.”
            The children all stood up, formed a line at the door, and began exiting the room.
            “Hold up a second, Winston. I want to talk to you for a minute.”
            “Yes, Miss. Crow?”
            Miss Crow waited for the last child to leave and then looked down at Winston. “Now Winston, you need to understand that what teachers choose to do on their own time is their own business and if you see a teacher doing something outside of school it is impolite to share what they were doing—whatever that may be—with your fellow classmates. Do you understand what I’m saying?”
            “I don’t understand. Are you ashamed for going to the Christmas Bizarre?” Winston’s eyes began to water. “Should I be ashamed for going to the Christmas Bizarre?”
            “No Winston, of course not. It’s alright. Say, do you like candy?”
            “Of course, Miss Crow.” Winston’s eyes dried and a smile lit up his face. “I am a child, after all.”
            “How about this—I’ll give you this box of chocolates if you promise not to say anything more to anybody about the Christmas Bizarre.”
            “Deal! But one question, Miss Crow.”
            “Yes, Winston.”
            "Why are these chocolates shaped like…”





           

            

Thursday, December 10, 2015

The Boy who didn't like Star Wars


            
            “You sunk my battleship,” Little Timmy frowned.
            “Ha! I win again!” Luke exclaimed. “Want to play another?”
            “You already won three in a row. Let’s do something else.”
            “Monopoly?”
            “That’s no fun with only two people.”
            “Risk?”
            “It’s one o’clock now,” Little Timmy said, “and I have to be home by six. We’ll never get a whole game in.”
            “I know!” Luke ran to his bed and grabbed a long plastic sword from beneath it. He pressed a button on the handle and it lit up bright red. “Let’s play Star Wars!”
            “I don’t like Star Wars,” Little Timmy responded.
            “Haha, that’s funny—you don’t like Star Wars. What are you going to tell me next, you don’t like Adele? Come on, you can be Han Solo.”
            “I’m serious, Luke. I don’t like Star Wars.”
            “But everybody likes Star Wars?”
            “I don’t.”
            “Stop kidding around,” Luke declared, “and admit that you like Star Wars.”
            “But I don’t.”
            “I’m warning you. If you don’t say that you like Star Wars I’ll…”
            “You’ll what?”
            “Just say it!”
            “I don’t like Star Wars!”
            With those words, Luke lost it. He struck Little Timmy across the head with his light saber and continued to pound his friend’s skull until the room was splattered in blood.
            Hearing the commotion, Luke’s mother ran upstairs and burst through the door. “Oh my God!” she screamed. “What have you done?”
            “He said he didn’t like Star Wars.”
            “Didn’t like Star Wars?” Luke’s mother was confused. “What do you mean, he didn’t like Star Wars?”
            “He said he didn’t like Star Wars and…and…and…” Luke began to cry.
            “It’s alright, honey, everything’s going to be okay.”
            Luke’s mother called Little Timmy’s mother. “Leia, there’s been an accident. You need to get over here as soon as possible…”
            When Leia arrived, she was taken to Luke’s bedroom, where she found her dead son’s body lying in a pool of blood. “What happened?” she screamed. “What happened to my son?”
            “Apparently,” Luke’s mother said, “he said he didn’t like Star Wars.”
            “What do you mean he said he didn’t like Star Wars? Obviously he was joking!”
            “Luke says he wasn’t.”
            “I don’t care what Luke says! My son is dead! Your son murdered him! Call the police for Christ’s sake!”
            The police arrived, taped off the crime scene, and began asking questions. “What do you mean he didn’t like Star Wars?” Detective Jawa asked. “He was obviously joking.”
            “I have a camera in Luke’s bedroom,” Luke’s mother explained. “We can watch the video.”
            They watched the video. “Well,” Detective Jawa said, “on one hand, it’s clear that Little Timmy wasn’t joking about not liking Star Wars, but on the other, Luke did murder him, so I think, unfortunately, we’ll have to press charges and let a jury decide his fate.”
            The case went to court and the jury didn’t know what to do. Sure, it was clear that Luke killed Little Timmy with a light saber, but the real question was: Did Little Timmy deserve it? After all, he did claim to not like Star Wars. I mean, do we really want people like that in our society? Wasn’t he most likely a sociopath? But it was murder. And murder was murder.
            “Guilty!” the jury proclaimed.
            Upon the verdict, riots immediately began across the nation. Hundreds of thousands of Star Wars fans, most dressed in costume, demonstrated in the streets, demanding that Luke be released from jail. It was all anybody talked about.
            Among those talking was billionaire, and Presidential Candidate, Ronald Boon, who declared to the nation that if he was elected to office, his first task would be to pardon Luke. His poll numbers instantly shot through the roof and that November he was elected President.
            On his first day in office, President Boon, staying true to his campaign pledge, pardoned Luke. On his second day, he began rounding up anybody who didn’t like Star Wars and placing them in concentration camps.
            A year into his term, President Boon began wearing a Darth Vader mask and declaring war on neighboring countries when new Star Wars films didn’t reach number one at their respective box offices.
            In June of that year he shot off his first nuke.
            By December, the world was destroyed.
            All because one boy didn’t like Star Wars.
            The end.









                        

Friday, December 4, 2015

Colored Snow



I was out winter camping
When my stomach started cramping
Telling me it was time to go
So I found the perfect spot
To kneel down and squat
And add some color to the snow
But when it came time to clean
I wasn’t feeling too keen
Letting out quite a massive moan
For I looked around the ground
And there wasn’t a leaf to be found
Forcing me to use a pine cone