I had no idea either but apparently there is a good chance every year of Christmas not happening. If you don’t believe me just watch more Christmas movies, they will tell you all about it.
For instance, unbeknownst to the children of the world, the father of Christmas himself was very nearly prevented from making his annual deliveries on account of some blinding fog. Now, why Santa had not come into poor weather in the thousands of years he had been in the business or why he never thought of headlights before is beyond me. However, thanks to a mutant reindeer, who had to have been born near Chernobyl, and his rare gift (or curse) of nasal illumination, Santa was able to fly safely around the world and pervade the global spread of fog. The world would never have known about how Rudolph saved Christmas if Burl Ives didn’t write a song about it.
Later we find that Santa has gotten sick, for the first time ever apparently, as well as fed up with the greedy consumerism of today’s American child. He decided that he simply would cancel Christmas because he didn’t feel it was worth it. Incredible! One man decided not have Christmas so we almost didn’t. Luckily Mrs. Claus stepped in and with the help of two elves, Jingle and Jangle, went down to Summertown to prove that kids still needed Christmas after all. After a musical battle with the spoiled children of Mother Nature, Heat and Snow Miser, Mrs. Clause got the whole thing straightened out in true puppet fashion. I learned all that in “The Year Without a Santa Clause.”
Santa was accused of attacking a man on 34th street in New York, but thankfully a thrilling court case proved his innocence and Santa was free to return to his job at Macy’s and Christmas was saved again. In the nineties we almost missed Christmas on account of Tim Allen refusing to accept the undeniable fact that because the old Santa fell off his roof and for some reason he had been so compelled to wear the Old Santa’s pants that he was in fact, the new Father Christmas. In the next movie, Christmas almost didn’t happen because Santa found out he had to be married to continue being Santa.
I have seen tons of movies where Santa gets kidnapped and even one where he has amnesia. I just watched one movie where Santa’s time limit for being Santa had run up and he had to pick a replacement before the Earth split open in two and there would be some kind of rift in the space-time continuum or something. He chose Whoopi Goldberg to be the new Santa, and I am still trying to wrap my mind around that one.
With so much riding on just one night and one man, it is scary to think of how many times it almost didn’t happen.
It is a good thing Christmas isn’t about him. It is about a baby called Emmanuel, whose name means God with us, which means he will always be there.
“For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”* Neither bad weather nor sickness, neither false accusations nor mistaken identity, will be able to separate Him from being with you this Christmas.
*(Romans 8:38-39 NIV)
Excellent, Kyle! I missed the one where Whoopi was Santa. Can't picture it��
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