Twas the night before Christmas
And one little mouse
Was gathering his friends
To run through our house.
As they ate at our food and watched
And ran at our feet
I took in my hands
An old baseball cleat
I watched them move fro
With sweat on my hands
I let that shoe go.
Smack went the shoe
Against the mouse head
I laughed to myself
And hoped it was dead.
I looked at the corpse
Dead on my floor
And sat in my chair
Waiting for more.
This I wrote "A Hoarder's Christmas" within the last few years.
‘Twas the night before Christmas,
And all through the house.
Lay a hot dirty mess,
Full of droppings of mouse.
The children were nestled,
In their beds oh-so-bare.
As they dreamt of the hoard,
And its mount of despair.
In the dark he appeared,
That big saint, Santa Claus.
He looked at the home,
Held his nose with a pause.
He peered down the chimney,
Down its sooty, black hole.
And knew in his heart,
This way he shant go.
The back door was jammed,
It simply was stuck.
Stacked with litter and trash,
Like an old garbage truck.
The windows were frosty,
Piles of junk strewn around.
Cobwebs in corners,
Food scraps on ground.
All around him was trash,
Up to his head, then some more.
He stepped on the rubbish,
That doubled as floor.
Something moved under foot,
Mice running fast on the go.
He sprinted outside,
And yacked in the snow.
He wiped the mess off,
And composed him anew.
But heaved one more time,
This time it was stew.
Back in the house,
He went to the tree.
To leave lots of presents,
For this hoarding family.
He cleared off a space,
Under that scant little tree.
And laid the gifts down,
For all them to see.
The deed was now done
The toys delivered with care.
He picked up the cookie,
And milk they left there.
The cookie he lifted,
To his mouth he did press.
Not realizing that he,
Was standing in dog mess.
“That’s the last straw”
Said the humble, old man.
And he wiped off his boots,
With some rusty old can.
With a twinkle in eye,
He said with a nod:
“I can do nothing for them,
Have mercy, dear God.”
He jumped in his sleigh,
He shot off to the border.
And yelled as he left,
“Merry Christmas dear hoarders”
And finally, a fond memory from my mission.
One Christmas in Jamaica was particularly memorable. I was serving in the capital, Kingston, and was part of a threesome companionship with Elder Bird and Elder Binns. Jamaicans are lovely people, but they didn’t invite us to formal dinners often. Christmas was completely different. Weeks before members started asking us if we’d join them for Christmas. It was wonderful – except we had back to back appointments throughout the day and each one wanted to feed us.
These weren’t small meals either. Each was a Christmas Feast, Jamaican style. Lots of fish, goat, chicken, delicious and prepared with lots of seasonings and love. As we went from house to house, they loaded up our plates and demanded we eat more.
By the early afternoon, we were engorged and couldn’t eat a single bite more. Our next stop was at a lovely widow’s home. We told her when we made the appointments that we wouldn’t have an appetite and wouldn’t be hungry by the time we arrived, and she said she understood. But to our surprise, she had prepared a rich Jamaican dinner – curried goat, rice and peas, roti, veggies, and much more. She was poor, and this meal represented a great sacrifice.
But we were stuffed. We saw the food and said, “we really appreciate it, but we just aren’t that hungry”. She was furious! She demanded that we eat, and instead of offending her, we strapped on the feed bag and went to work.
Every morsel was pain. Eat bite was driven by force of will. We marched on, struggling to finish the Bataan Death March of food.
The first to finish was Elder Binns. He leaned back in his chair, gloating. He sized up our still full plates and his own empty one. He knew he had finished the marathon first. And he let us know it.
“May I please use the bathroom”, he asked. Whether to purge or relieve himself, we never knew. The Sister escorted him away.
As we watched him leave, Elder Bird and I sprang into action.
We took Elder Binns plate and began filling the void. Spoonful after spoonful, we replenished his supply. Truly, his cup runneth over.
When he returned triumphant, an entire plate of food awaited him. His reveling turned to misery as he faced the next trial. The ring of fire came soon after.
In the end, it was a belly busting Christmas away from home. It remains one of my funniest mission memories. For me, it was a magical Christmas on a small island, far from home.
