Somewhere this moment in the big sanctuary of a Big Church, my wife, kids & in-laws are are at a candle light service celebrating the Dear Savior's birth. I couldn't join them because some new developments in my job kept me working longer than I had anticipated. This work involved a twenty-something man who stabbed another twenty-something man to death. The fight had to do with some kind of romantic entanglement and I don't know specific details. The District Attorney said he's filed more cases this year than in all his 16 years as a prosecutor. "Merry Christmas," he said.
Jukebox played Cab Calloway's "Minnie the Moocher," followed by Louis Armstrong's "What a Wonderful World." I view this song by Satchmo as appropriate for Christmas. It's full of hope for a --
better world. My favorite line is about the babies. "They'll learn much more than I'll ever know." I've always found it interesting how this song was released the same year Jimi Hendrix's "Voodoo Chile" came out. Both sides of a world in perpetual motion.
Then U2's version of "Christmas (Baby Please Come Home). Nobody will ever top Darlene Love, but this is good and don't we need all the good things we can get? Like a short, aglow Christmas tree inside a lonely window. If it's there, I think the lights are like hope and hope can exist in tiny windows, just as it can in the church. I picture my family now with the glorious display - "Carol of the Bells" playing. I think of the lit up sacks lining the driveways of the Ridgewood District tonight in my hometown, Jett, Kan. (pop. 4,000) in the early '70s.
In those days, my family had celebrated on Christmas Eve night at my grandma Mac's house. Then we would open presents at home on Christmas morning. They say every family has Christmas traditions (at least those in America who celebrate Christmas) and this was ours. Anyhow, at Grandma & Grandpa's house, it became a tradition every year to take a picture of the kids (siblings, cousins) sitting around the Christmas tree. This started around Christmas, 1974. I always thought it was neat how the grandparents always had a real life Christmas tree. My family had a fake one, but then the old people were always more rustic. No air conditioning, clothes hung on a clothes line (in the garage during winter).
Lately, my mom has been thinking her mother is still alive and I don't correct her. "She's not doing so well," she says, concern in her voice. "Grandma - she's doing great," I say. "She's quite healthy. Back to her effervescent self." "Really," Mom says, smiling as if she's relieved. "I'm happy to hear that."
I told the nursing director at the facility where Mom lives that the old guy with the whitish gray beard who came to see her was most likely her brother, just like she told them.
Sitting here at Leroy's, the dive bar near the Chinese laundry, frat houses and public radio station in the district outside Wichita State University. Shocker game last night was too much for some people like myself, prone to anxiety - 80-79 in overtime. I was at home. Made it there around 8 p.m. Watched the Heat Miser from the 1974 Christmas special, The Year Without a Santa Claus. "Dad loves this stuff," my wife, Maria, told our daughter Gabby. Max, our son, was in his room, playing Mario Party.
There's a small Christmas tree in the window of Leroy's, underneath the ancient neon Schlitz sign. Lights give me hope, make me think of seeing my family and whatever is out there for the world.
