Mixed Nuts
Mixed Nuts
Ebenezer Scrooge had a very Merry
Christmas. He shuffled home, glad to see it. He touched the knocker, unlocked
the place and slipped inside. He readied himself for bed. He started a fire,
sat down in his chair, and finally had a moment to take it all in. He felt warm
within himself, unlike he had known before. He rested well in his madness. He
felt no need to lock the inner door to his chamber. He expected no further
disruption. The large room fell to shadow as two large tapers, never before used,
beckoned a glow to the space not experienced in many a year. The hearth was
full and crackling and oozed an unfamiliar heat over the old curmudgeon. His
mind wandered to the spirits and to the images that had been cast before him.
The day behind seemed greater now and approaching the end of it, he no longer
required visitations. He no longer feared the chains which held Marley, nor did
he taunt himself with the scowl “Mankind was my business.” He knew these ghosts
would no longer haunt him, but their voices always would. He knew that life
would be different for him now. He looked about the almost empty room and
thought on all that had been revealed to him. He thought of Fran, his sister,
gone now these many years. He thought of his nephew Fred and the joy which
seemed to possess him upon Scrooge’s attendance at the Christmas meal. He
thought of Belle, her beautiful face as young to his mind as if a ghost had
driven him to the past once again. He thought of Cratchit and Tim and of the
mission to which he had taken. Ebenezer Scrooge was indeed a changed man. The
years of endless alone and empty now found him filled with a spirit and joy few
possess. It was not uncomfortable for him. It fit like an old sock. The shadows
of the man he had been moved across the room like an echo, rippling in
concussive beats from the heart within him now come to life. He sat soothed by
an almost silent sense, as the fire snapped and danced about in the pit. How
often had he sat here, miserable, cursing the very spirit within him now? Too
many nights had he known his own torture. As the fire dimmed and sleep
summoned, Ebenezer Scrooge, for the first time in his life, was not afraid to
rest.
When
he drew back his bed curtains, Mrs. Dilber crossed his cheery mind. How he had
overlooked her for so long. How he had overlooked everyone for so long. He
changed into his nightwear and stoked the fire one last time. He did a little
jig as he jumped from the floor right to the top of the mattress. He pulled the
cover like a little child, up to his chest with both hands. He looked at the
smouldering and looked at the glow and his heart was filled with wonder. As he
drifted from voice to voice and time to time, he knew nothing but lunacy.
“I am sure I have
always thought of Christmas time, when it has come round -- apart from the
veneration due to its sacred name and origin, if anything belonging to it can
be apart from that -- as a good time: a kind, forgiving, charitable, pleasant
time: the only time I know of, in the long calendar of the year, when men and
women seem by one consent to open their shut-up hearts freely, and to think of
people below them as if they really were fellow-passengers to the grave, and
not another race of creatures bound on other journeys.” (A Christmas
Carol, Charles Dickens 1843)
Jeremy Reed was 17 years old when
his period three English teacher caught him with Steve Canner, behind the stage
in the Theatre Arts room. Christmas Eve day and his world changed with a moment
of pleasure. Almost immediately the ripples of rumour echoed throughout the
hallways of this very Christian academy. There was little he could do as he sat
in front of principal Malloy. He was trembling, both inside and out. Fear
consumed him. He could not imagine what to do or what was to come. His parent’s
arrived in the mid- afternoon, just in time for the condemnation and judgment
and Christmas Eve. He was almost relieved when he was expelled. Life could
never be the same at Calvary Christian Secondary Institute. He knew that
reality was over. His refusal to rebuke himself held just as dire consequence
at home as it did at school. While the Christmas tree shone for all to see and
the Nativity Scene sat in streams of light on the front lawn, Jeremy knew he
was in trouble. First his father played the denial game. He refused to admit a
child of his could be such an abomination before God. Next came the bargaining
and the pleas that God strike the demon from his only son. At last, then came
the anger. It wasn’t the first time his father had hit him while his mother
submitted in the background. It wasn’t the last time he would feel the shame
and the trap of a life filled with Jesus. When Jeremy refused to allow his
father to cast out the unclean spirit, he was given two choices. Either Jeremy
allows a counsel of elders and the laying on of hands for an exorcism or he
could get out, never to return. Resolved, with little option, Jeremy sealed his
fate. He walked to the door, grabbed his coat and looked around for his mother.
She sat like a confused deer stuck in the headlights of a Jesus truck. His
father stood firm and banished the boy from his family, his home and his life.
It was God’s will and law. The last thing he heard his father say, as he exited
stage left, was “And take off that ‘Jesus loves me’ shirt.” From the driveway,
Jeremy was tempted to smash the Nativity scene but, he recognized the futility
when dealing with this kind of God. He walked out into the street, looked up at
the snow and realized he was fucked. Christmas Eve brought little peace for
Jeremy. He had tried to call his friends and family members to secure a place
to sleep but to no avail. The community Jeremy had grown up in did not fool
around when it came to sin and shunning. He knew he could really never go back
and somewhere within, he knew he didn’t want to. With no money, no where to go
and the wrath of the Lord chasing him through the snow, Jeremy made a decision
all too familiar to souls lost on the most Holy of nights. He didn’t pray to Jesus;
he didn’t even call out to God; he just sat down on the curb of what used to be
his life and he cried.
John and Marge Reed were God
fearing people. In fact, they feared God so much it often crippled them as
human beings. As the tree lights went on this Christmas morning and the sounds
of Christmas splendour filled the house, they gave no outward thought to
Jeremy. No one wondered where he had spent the night and most certainly, no one
worried if he was alright. It was certain madness. They had their coffee, said
their morning prayers and got ready to go to church. When the tree lights went
off and the sounds of the season became muted and as impotent as the compassion
expressed the night before, John Reed opened the garage door and stepped down
on the cold cement. It dangled a little, wrapped in Christmas lights and
hanging from the beams of the ceiling above. “Jesus loves me” shone in the soft
glow of electric sin.
(Calvin Coolidge, American President)
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