The Ultimate Christmas Movie and the ultimate Christmas song. I've been trying to figure out, over the past few weeks, what they would be. I still haven't figured out, but I've found the ultimate picture and quote.
Nobody ever told me, Tiger Woods said, how much I was going to love this little girl. He decided to play Daddy instead of playing The Buick and since Buick is one of his big sponsors, that was a big deal.
So what's that got to do with Christmas? Nothing - except that now is the time of year when we celebrate birth. The winter solstice is the shortest day of the year, and the new year is born. Those of us who are Druids put up Christmas trees, the Jewish among us give dreidels and other toys to children, and the Christians pretend that there were shepherds out minding their flocks of sheep in the mideast in December. Jesus of Nazareth was probably born in August.
And as much as the idiot on Fox complains about people saying "Happy Holidays", Christmas starts on December 25 and runs 12 Days through January 6. We're in the season of Thanksgiving, Kwanzaa, Saturnalia, Festivus, Hannukah, and New Year's as well as Christmas - it's the Holiday Season.
But if it's not his birthday, it is our celebration of his birth, and the calendar really doesn't matter. One might as well chastize Christians for ignoring the Sabbath, which runs from sundown Friday to sundown Saturday, in favor of Sunday.
Babies are a good reason for celebrating, and if Tiger Woods is late to the party in realizing that, let's be happy for him, that he knows it now.
Some of my happiest memories are of going grocery shopping with Jasper. We'd get to Maloley's, and he knew exactly where we were, and what the game was. He'd rush to unbuckle himself, and he'd try to climb atop me before I could unbuckle myself.
That didn't work well; I couldn't get out of the car with him on my shoulders. But as soon as I was outside the car, I'd hoist him up, and he'd grab ahold of my scalp for balance - not much there to grab, I admit - and we'd head for the door. The electronic door would open, and I'd walk up to the doorway, oblivious to the fact that, as a combination, we were taller than the doorway.
At the very last moment, I'd halt, and Jasper would erupt in a cackle of laughter. It was a game we never tired of.
Once in a while, Jasper's mom would come along. It wasn't often. Lupus is an exhausting disease, and the three things that make it worse are sunlight, fatigue, and stress - things hard for a toddler's mother to avoid - so we tried to do as many chores for her as we could.
And grocery shopping was something special for Jasper and me. He wasn't a hollow kid by any means; he was muscular, dense, and he knew when he leaned to the right, he could effectively steer me that way, but he was also a well-mannered kid, and when I said he couldn't have something, he generally took "no" for an answer.
If that's not another reason for a father to love a kid, I don't know what would be. Women don't take "no" for an answer. Heck, women don't take "yes" for an answer. Give in, in order to end an argument, and they're still beating up on you ten minutes later.
And if I knew babes were babe magnets, I'd have rented one when I was still single. It took me most of my 20s to learn how to meet women and ask them out. Walk through a grocery store with a kid on your shoulders, and women swarm all over you. Sheesh.
So if Tiger and Elin are the world's happiest couple right now, my only complaint is that there aren't more people trying to outdo them. The best Christmas gift isn't under the tree. It's in the manger, or in the bassinet.
There are many Christmas traditions that I'm trying to bring back, at least for myself, if not for everybody. For instance, the sack of candy they gave every kid at the Armory, when they visited Santa, had a handful of cut rock, and a couple of opera cremes, an orange, an english walnut, and a candy cane.
Every season, I look for opera cremes in stores. Those are little domes, about 1.5" tall, white cream inside, with a thin coating of chocolate. Once in a while, I've found something that looks like them - but they don't taste right. They're coated with chocolate-colored paraffin, or the inside is all waxy or it's gritty with crystallized sugar.
Cut rock is hard candy, about the size of a nickel or a quarter, maybe a third of an inch thick. There's a little picture in three or four colors, molded all the way through, and the outside of the circle is a solid color, red, or orange, or blue or green. I think it comes from Germany. In the past thirty years, I've seen it maybe 3 or 4 times, and it never tastes very good.
Candy canes are no problem, as long as you look for the Spangler's brand. Spangler's are also the people who make Dum-Dum suckers. Other brands of candy canes don't have the same flavor of peppermint. Bob's, for instance, is sharper and hotter, not as flavorful. Spangler's has the same rich peppermint flavor tht you find in a bottle of DeKuyper's Peppermint Schnapps.
And chocolate covered cherries are better than when I was a kid, as long as you look for Cella's brand, enrobed in dark chocolate. They send my blood sugar sky-high, and it's worth it. What's the point of a luxury that isn't luxurious?
I'm still looking for the best Christmas movie. "Miracle on 34th Street" is nice, and so is "It's a Wonderful Life" but they seem awfully sweet. I'm leaning towards "Die Hard". It's not really a story about a baby, but it's a love story. Part way through the movie, Hans and Karl return to where the hostages are being held, and Karl smashes a table of glasses in fury. Holly says "He's still alive."
Her coworker, Ginny, goes, what? Holly says, "Only John can drive somebody that crazy."
I'm leaning towards Die Hard because I recently learned that my favorite waitress's husband died four years ago, as the result of injuries he received from cops.
Good cooks and great waitresses are special people. They don't just do a really difficult job, but they're doing God's work. They say one is nearer God's heart in a garden than anywhere else on earth, and that's because that's where food comes from. Those who tend carefully for the bounty of the earth, and give succor to their fellow man, give hospitality, and the warmth of the hearth, are angels.
And I suppose this guy was doing something to attract the attention of the cops, but cops are only supposed to apprehend criminals, not execute them, and his widow certainly did nothing to deserve that kind of punishment.
A couple of bucks left behind is just a couple of bucks. I'd like to have her sit down to a good cup of coffee and a great piece of pie, with someone rubbing her feet, and someone rubbing her back as well - but it's her husband's hands she needs.
And John McClane can yell "Yippie-Ki-Yay", and shoot Hans Gruber, but there ain't no way I can make things all right for this widow.