a primitive Christmas Carol

[franksolich]

--"a primitive Christmas Carol," obviously a take-off of the Charles Dickens classic, is respectfully dedicated to the pie-and-jam primitive, grasswire, in the hopes that grasswire will enjoy this remembrance of her now-gone best friend on Skins's island, the hippywife primitive, Mrs. Alfred Packer.

This story follows the same pattern as the original of Dickens, with "staves" rather than chapters, of which there were three in the original, and will be three in this, as franksolich guides hippywife through Christmases past, present, and to come, with the, uh, inevitable denouement. 

A "stave," as the word was used in olden times, is a verse of a song.

[franksolich]

a primitive Christmas Carol…..hippywife Mrs. Alfred Packer twisted and turned on the old couch, trying to find a position where she wouldn’t be so sore and aching from the pummeling hippyhubby Wild Bill had given her in the morning, after she’d mentioned something about it being Christmas Eve.

“Damn it, woman,“ Wild Bill had cursed; “you know we don’t do Christmas, but I’m always having to drum it into your head, every single year.  We don’t do Christmas.  We don’t do Christmas.  We don’t do Christmas, get that straight.

“We’re not damned fundies here.

“I hope you got that straight,“ hippyhubby said, after knocking out one of Mrs. Alfred Packer’s bottom teeth.  â€œWe don’t do Christmas, woman,“ he’d said as he walked out the door, leaving hippywife panting for breath.

She sighed, looking over at the table at the other end of the living room, covered with a red-and-green oilcloth tablecloth.  She’d told Wild Bill it was the colors of the Irish Communist Party, a little white lie he’d accepted.

But it was the only sign of Christmas this desolate winter afternoon in this rustic house amidst the mountains and forests of rural northeastern Oklahoma.

Mrs. Alfred Packer quietly cried herself to sleep.

In late afternoon, just as it was getting dark, hippywife suddenly woke up, finding a small boy standing by the side of the couch, looking at her.

She had no idea where he’d come from. He could‘ve been only three years old, or five years old, or nine years old; pale skin, a Welsh cast to his features, sharp nose, dark brown hair. He wore his hair in a most peculiar way, a “page-boy” style that had gone out of fashion more than ninety years ago. He was wearing a light blue cotton shirt, brown corduroy pants, and brown leather shoes.

He stared at her, saying nothing.

Mrs. Alfred Packer stared back at him. He was small, and looked pretty harmless to her.

He shyly handed her something; a greetings-card.

She looked, and gasped at the front, “Behold, I tell you tidings of great joy.”  Alarmed, without even opening it, she shoved it into the wood-burning stove that kept the living room warm.

“I’m sorry, child,” hippywife said; “but we don’t do Christmas here; that would set Wild Bill like a rocket, seeing that.”

He stared at her, saying nothing.

“Goodness, child, where’d you come from?” Mrs. Alfred Packer asked; “it’s dangerous out here, with scufflaws and moonshiners and meth kitchens and ruffians and hillbillies and illiterates and madmen, the only place in Oklahoma one can escape from the fundies.

“You see, hippyhubbyWild Bill doesn‘t like decent and civilized people,” she explained.  

He stared at her, saying nothing.

He walked across the living room and stood on a bench, facing her.

“Good King Wenceslas looked out, on the Feast of Stephen,” he started.  He was trying to sing, but in the manner of someone who’d never heard singing, and it was all coming out as practiced speech in a child’s voice.

“When the snow lay around about, deep and crisp and even,” he continued, carefully enunciating every word, every syllable.

Spreading his arms, “Brightly shone the moon that night, though the frost was cruel,” and then half-bowing, swinging his arms as if a pendulum, “When a poor man came in sight, gathering winter fuel…..”

Mrs. Alfred Packer grew more alarmed at this, than she had at the appearance of the Christmas card, now ashes in the fire of the stove.  Suppose Wild Bill were around, and heard.

And hippyhubby had mentioned only the day before that the meat-freezer was getting low on provisions.

She stiffly arose from the couch, and put her hand over the child’s mouth, to shush him.

His skin seemed unusually cold, cold as the snow outdoors.  She tried cupping his chin in her hands, brushing away the hair on the side of his head, to which he abruptly jerked back, as if she were a stranger trying to touch something she mustn‘t.

She took his ice-cold hand and walked him into the kitchen, setting him down on a chair at the table there.  Without saying anything, but the meaning clear, he indicated he’d like a glass of milk, and so Mrs. Alfred Packer reached into the refrigerator for that.

While pouring the milk, hippywife thought he looked emaciated, and could use something to eat.  Again, without saying a word, he indicated he’d like a grilled cheese sandwich, real cheese on real wheat bread, with real butter for oiling the cast-iron griddle on the stove.

Mrs. Alfred Packer kept chitchatting to him, but while he seemed to absorb what she told him, he refused to emit anything in return, instead merely staring at her.

What a well-mannered little boy, she thought, excepting that he doesn’t talk back. But she did start feeling some unease about him; there was something not quite right. She imagined he was hollow, or from another world, or some sort of phenomenon never seen before. He was real, but then too he wasn’t real.

Mrs. Alfred Packer turned on the gas to the stove, and reached for a match.

Suddenly hippywife and her guest were soaring, as if birds, over the snow-covered hills, valleys, trees, plains, rivers, of Missouri, southern Illinois, central Indiana, and finally, circling around northern Ohio…..

next: Stave One

[franksolich]

As they circled, descending, hippywife Mrs. Alfred Packer recognized the neighborhood as where she’d grown up, in a working-class section of the city, miles and miles of streets faced with row-houses, and in front of them, automobiles she recognized as being from the late 1950s.

Then suddenly they were in the kitchen in the back of her own childhood home, her grey drab tired mother sitting at the table wringing her hands, talking with the heating-oil deliveryman.

“I’m so sorry,” she told him, “but we were down to just two gallons, and Christmas is tomorrow, and things are tight, but the husband can pay you after the New Year’s.  We know it’s always cash-on-delivery, but we’re hoping, hoping, hoping, you’ll carry us a few days.

“We just don’t have any money, and Christmas is tomorrow…..”

“Not to worry, ma’am, the deliveryman said; “it’s Christmas, and the boss tells us to be a little easy on collections.  Paying after New Year’s fine.

“And,” he added, “by the way, per instructions of the boss, because it’s Christmas, I poured an extra twenty-five gallons into the tank, no charge.”

Mrs. Alfred Packer’s mother gasped in astonishment.

“God….bless…..you,” she managed to let out.

“Don’t thank me,” the deliveryman told her.  “Thank the boss, a fine Christian gentleman.

“Oh, and…..

“…..in honor of your new infant daughter, the instructions were to pour in another extra twenty-five gallons, no charge.”

Mrs. Alfred Packer’s mother began weeping, copiously.

“It’s Christmas, ma’am,” he reminded her.

“God bless us, everyone,” she cried, hugging the deliveryman.

- - - - - - - - - -

Then suddenly hippywife and her guide were in the living room, and it seemed a few years later.

Mrs. Alfred Packer noticed that her companion seemed to be growing with her, he still a child, but no longer a small child.

The family was gathered around the Christmas tree, the children on the floor, unwrapping presents.

Mrs. Alfred Packer glowed in delight when she recognized something, a Barbie doll she’d gotten when she was nine years old.  And the wardrobe, full of miniature nun’s habits for Barbie.

And there was old Gram, sitting in the recliner, beaming upon her grandchildren.

Mrs. Alfred Packer shed a few tears remembering old Gram, of Italianate derivation and withered, mottled skin when hippywife was still a girl.  She’d been a little woman, and her body was way too small to contain the love she had for all.  Her spaghetti-and-meatballs, lasagna, and pepperoni pizza had been legendary.

“God bless us, everyone,” old Gram murmured, as she watched the children open more presents.

Mrs. Alfred Packer’s eyes wettened, and her guide noticed it.

“Oh, I’m just thinking of poor old dear Gram,” hippywife said; “the woman a font of love and joy, but during her last years I was mean to her, calling her an old lady out of touch with the new times and that I was ashamed of her and her silly superstitious ways.

“I never had the chance to take it back.”

- - - - - - - - - -

Now they were in the neighborhood church, and hippywife now 17 years old, attending Midnight Mass not with her family, but for the first time alone with her high-school beau, Johnny.

The church was packed, and Mrs. Alfred Packer sat glued to Johnny, adoration of his handsome face in her eyes.  And he smelled so good, that cologne he was using.  She slanted her head on his shoulder.

So handsome, so masculine, so strong, so well-dressed this night, so nice-smelling, Johnny.

Hundreds of choir-boys burst out singing “Once In Royal David’s City” as the priests bearing crosses aloft and scores of altar boys swayed canisters of incense back-and-forth, the bishop himself sprinkling Holy Water over the congregation as the long procession walked down one aisle, and then another, and then a third, in the candle-lit dark interior of the church.

It was a long service, about three hours, as the choir sang dozens of sacred Christmas hymns, and then the bells outside began to peal, loudly and gloriously in the dark night, “Christ is born.”

Then they were outside, the snow falling in slow gentle flakes, decorating their faces.

“God bless us, everyone,” Johnny greeted passers-by.

- - - - - - - - - -

They were now back inside hippywife’s childhood home, but it seemed colder than it had been, and a few years later.

Her father and mother were talking in the living room, her father obviously angry.

“I don’t know what’s gotten into that girl,” he said; “we raised her right, gave her all the love and trust and guidance that she needed, and to have her turn out this way.

“She’s rejected everything that’s good and decent--God, family values, honesty in all things, hard work, substance over style, common courtesy and good manners, us her parents, and even dear old Gram.

“And now she’s even dumped Johnny, saying he’s not good enough for her.  Johnny, who works at the tire factory so as to build her a suburban bungalow to house all the children they should have.

“There’s nobody who’d make a better son-in-law, than Johnny.

“There’s nobody who’d treat her better, far better than she deserves to be treated, than Johnny.

“Ever since she got turned onto drugs and women‘s lib, she’s turned bad.  She’s not our daughter any more.

“Mark my words, dear; she’s going to end shacking up with an old hippie bum or something.”

Mrs. Alfred Packer’s mother wept.

As did hippywife also, even though she and her guide were invisible to the two grieving parents.

next: Stave Two

[franksolich]

Mrs. Alfred Packer and her guide were now about equal in age, near the present, when they appeared at the hospital bed-side of the hippywife’s mother, who was slowly slipping away from this time and place.

Recently arrived back in Ohio on a Greyhound bus from Oklahoma, hippywife was appalled at the sight of her mother, wasting away, near life’s journey’s end.

Her tired mother opened her eyes, and gazed upon her errant daughter.

“Please,” she whispered, “please grant me one last wish.

“Please come back--come back to God, come back to family, come back to the way you once were, decent and civilized.  Please--”

Mrs. Alfred Packer sobbed, grabbing her mother’s hand, coming close to relenting.

But then the telephone on the bed-side table rang.  It was hippyhubby Wild Bill, demanding that she return to Oklahoma pronto, if she knew what was good for her.  â€œYou’re in this as deep as I am, and I ain’t going down alone,” he said.  â€œGet your ass back down here, woman.”

Mrs. Alfred Packer dropped her mother’s hand and rushed to the bus station.

- - - - - - - - - -

It was Christmas Eve 2012 now, and soaring eastward through the skies, hippywife and franksolich alit on the lawn of a home in an affluent suburb of Baltimore, where they peeked inside a window.

The sparkling old dude was seen, serving Christmas Eve dinner to his trophy wife and his stepdaughter, oddly attired in a clown costume.

“Get down on your knees and bark,” his wife commanded him.  

“But dear, I’m tired of humiliating myself for your amusement,” the sparkling old dude whined.

His stepdaughter, laughing, flung a piece of mashed potato at him.

“Get down on your knees and bark,” his wife ordered again.

“Please don’t make me degrade myself,” the sparkling old dude begged.

“Please.”

“If you want to keep me, get down on your knees and bark,” the trophy wife repeated.  â€œI’m bored and I need some entertainment.  And while down there, rub the inside of your leg against mine.”

“But I don’t want to,” the sparkling old dude pleaded.

“Look,” his wife snapped; “you’re wrinkly and old and bald, and I’m still young and aesthetic.  I’m doing you a favor, ‘loving’ you when I’d have no problems getting some man younger and richer, to love me.

“If you want to keep me, get down on your knees and bark.”

- - - - - - - - - -

Mrs. Alfred Packer and franksolich were now soaring westward, finally coming down in front of a home in suburban Omaha, wherein lived the big guy and his wife Marta.

It was Christmas Eve there too, and the big guy’s children were there, sitting around the dining room table as Omaha Steve showed them something, three screws.

“These are from my chair at my desk at the Omaha police department,” the big guy explained.  â€œI took them out this afternoon, and then when I go back to work the day after Christmas, I’ll sit down and come crashing to the floor, hurting my back.

“Fat city,” the big guy roared; “a six-figure sum as settlement for having been hurt by defective property, and a life-time ride on the disability gravy-train.”

- - - - - - - - - -

Mrs. Alfred Packer and franksolich continued to soar west, but in a southerly direction, finding themselves in front of a Streisandian mansion west of San Diego, California, in a gated county-club neighborhood wherein lived the rich bitch, the kpete primitive.

Her servants, Hector the gardener, Maria the cook, and Angelita the cleaning woman, were standing in front of the door, having come to collect their $100 Christmas bonuses.

The kpete primitive pooh-poohed the idea, telling them there would be no Christmas bonuses and that they were fired.  â€œEven though I’ve paid you $5 an hour, cash under the table, you’re all more trouble than you’re worth.  I’ve found some Vietnamese willing to do twice the work at only $4 an hour now.

“Get out of here before I call the police.”

- - - - - - - - - -

Then hippywife and franksolich flew north, up to Oregon, where they stopped in front of a pie-and-jam shoppe owned and operated by the grasswire primitive.

At the same time, the Die alte Sau, the Proud2BLibKansan primitive, pulled up in front, at the wheel of a 2013 Mercedes-Benz.  Behind her came Pamela, the demtenjeep primitive, in a 2013 Jaguar.

They walked inside the shoppe together, and were greeted by grasswire, “Free pie for the rich, for teachers and other government employees, two-fifty a slice for the hoi polloi, the laboring masses.”

After they got their pie and sat down, there came into the store the little ragged match-girl, her pale and emaciated little brother in hand.  It’d been a cold, blustery day on the street, and there hadn’t been many takers for matches at a penny apiece.  She was barefoot and blue, but her little brother was much more far gone.

“A piece of pie, ma’am, please, for my little brother,” the wretched match-girl begged; “he hasn’t eaten in four days.

“Please, ma’am.”

The pie-and-jam primitive glared at the little match-girl; she preferred a higher class clientele.

“It’s two-fifty a slice,” she said; “you got two-fifty?”

The wan little match-girl searched among the rags she was wearing, finding a penny here-and-there.

After all was said-and-done, she’d piled $2.43 on the counter.

“I need seven more cents,” grasswire pointed out.  â€œYou got seven more cents?”

The little match-girl looked at her, pleading.  â€œNo, I don’t ma’am, that’s all I have.

“It’s for my little brother; we both haven’t eaten in four days, but he’s littler, and in more need than I am.  He’s starving, ma’am.  Please, ma’am.”

“Get out of here,” the pie-and-jam primitive barked; “I’m not in this business for my health.”

next: Stave Three

[franksolich]

A cold circling wind arose, transporting hippywife and franksolich through the air again, setting them down in the emergency room of the hospital in Tulsa, Oklahoma, where hippyhubby Wild Bill was being brought in on a stretcher.

“They got me, woman, revenuers and the sheriff.  I’m full of holes, I’m a sieve, and I’m not long for this world, woman.

“I wish I could take you with me, down where I’m going. 

“You gotta promise me, woman, you won’t do Christmas after I’m gone.”

Mrs. Alfred Packer sobbed.  “Do you have anything you want to tell me before you go, Wild Bill?”

“I got plenty to tell you, but there ain’t time,” hippyhubby roared.

Falling back on the stretcher, Wild Bill asked, “Remember the Federal Express delivery man?

“Remember those steaks we had three days later?

“Remember Hop Sing, the chink cookware salesman?

“Remember the chow mein we had for supper that night?

“Remember Shouting Bob, that fundie preacher?

“Remember the roast ribs we had at the barbeque the next day?

“Remember that stranded motorist on the highway that one night?

“Remember the sausages we had for breakfast in the morning?

“Remember the porcine kid who got lost in the woods?

“Remember how much bacon we had?

“Remember that Sunday School superinten--,” after which hippyhubby gasped, and passed from this time and place.

Mrs. Alfred Packer’s hair stood on end, and she clutched at franksolich for comfort.

- - - - - - - - - -

The table-radio began blaring out “It Came Upon A Midnight Clear,” the announcer intoning, “Good morning, folks, it’s Christmas morning, and a Merry Christmas to you all out there in radioland.

“God bless us, everyone.”

Mrs. Alfred Packer sleepily turned over on the couch.

So it was Christmas, and hippyhubby Wild Bill was no more.

She looked around for her visitor, but he was nowhere to be seen.  She was alone.

But never mind; hippywife was free, free at last, to do Christmas.  She danced a jig, best an overweight older woman could dance a jig, into the kitchen, where she rifled among the drawers for things to do Christmas with.  There wasn’t much there, because in all their years of marriage, hippyhubby Wild Bill had cleared the place of all Christmasey items, but she did find a few half-burned-down candles.

She could put a lighted candle in every window, an ancient Christmas tradition.

Putting the first candle in the window by the stove, she reached for a match, forgetting that she’d turned on the gas the night before.

the end

[Delmar]

“I wear the chain I forged in life....I made it link by link, and yard by yard; I girded it on of my own free will, and of my own free will I wore it.”
― Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol

[Chris_]

Bravo!

I love a story with a good end.

[franksolich]

Bravo!

I love a story with a good end.

There's a story behind the story.

The introductory part I wrote last year, planning to put up "a primitive Christmas Carol" at that time.

I forget what interfered, but I never got around to it.  So this introductory part is a second draft, because I refined on what I wrote last year.

Staves One, Two, and Three are off-the-cuff first drafts, written yesterday (Thanksgiving) and immediately posted.

After I'd posted the whole story, I ran across notes I'd made, and damn it, I wish I'd seen those notes earlier.

In Stave Two, the death-bed scene of the hippywife primitive's mother was supposed to be based upon Mrs. Alfred Packer's description of the actual event circa two years and one month ago, a piece she'd posted in the Lounge on Skins's island.  The hippywife primitive can be a good writer when she puts her mind to it; her account of the event read very much like the death of Little Nell, bringing tears to the eyes.

But I was too tired to look that up.

And yes, she did go running back to hippyhubby Wild Bill down in Oklahoma, abandoning her still-living-but-rapidly-failing mother, not going back to Ohio until the funeral.

The part involving the rich bitch the kpete primitive had been meant to be longer, more descriptive, and more-accurately harsh about the rich bitch.  Also, I'd meant to have a glimpse of the Las Vegas Leviathan, Jeanette, and Joe dealing with a problem, but I totally forgot that.

Stave Three was a disaster, but I was really tired by then.  I had plans for a better description of the emergency room at the hospital, but as I said, I was tired, wiped out.  And then the end was awkward; I had to devise a means for the hippywife primitive to realize it'd been a dream--excepting the part about her turning on the natural gas earlier in the evening--and find some way she'd light a match now, several hours later (after her slumber).

But I was tired, and blew it.

It's hardly up to the standards of most of what I write, but since it's dedicated to a primitive, oh well.