We weren't really in the Christmas spirit when we started out.
Wait, I'll begin at the beginning, I suppose. K.T. called last night to invite Matt and I over to have dinner and watch a movie. They'd rented Clerks, which Matt has been suggesting that I see for some time, and so we went. Dinner was chicken with some sort of Mexican-style sauce, over white rice, with what I think was Spanish rice on the side, and it was good - almost but not quite too spicy for me, which means it was bland as hell for everyone else, I guess. The movie was fun; anyone who's ever worked a shitty job that involved dealing with the public will find something familiar in it.
After the movie, while we were sitting around chatting, K.T. came up with the idea - and a very bright idea it was - to pile into their car and ride around looking at tacky Christmas decorations.
We rode through a few neighborhoods, pointing and laughing and sniggering at people's bad taste. One place would have looked very nice, except they'd used all red lights, making it look more like a set for Hellowe'en than full for joy. Another went the same route, except they used all green lights, giving the house and yard a gangrenous glow. Frequently we'd encounter houses where no individual decoration was awful, but they hadn't known when to stop, and the result was a garish explosion of light and color. As I said at the beginning, we weren't really in the Christmas spirit, here.
Then I got a yen to ride through the neighborhood I grew up in, since we were nearby. We were driving around in circles, merrily getting ourselves lost, when we encountered the Queen Mother of all Tacky Christmas Houses.
A couple of times before, we'd made Kevin pull over so we could stare in awe at displays of great Tack. This time, we made him park the car, and we all got out to take a closer look. I don't think there was a square yard of their front yard that wasn't host to some sort of display - electric train tracks, semi-animated light displays, cardboard carollers, "Santa Stop Here" signs, snowmen, nutcrackers... Every straight line of the house was outlined with lights of some sort. There were three different light displays on the roof, depicting Snoopy, Mickey Mouse, and Pluto, all wearing - of course - Santa hats. But the coup de grace of the place was the animatronics. As you walked up the driveway, you found yourself facing a pair of sliding glass doors that opened into what was obviously once a garage that had been converted into some sort of playroom or den. One of the doors was open to the night air, though a thigh-high picket fence (decorated, of course) gently prevented entry. Inside, every inch of this room (the size of a one-car garage) - I mean every inch - was part of an animatronic display of some sort. Most of them were Santas. Santa in bed and snoring (the blanket over his belly rose and fell with the sound of the snores); Santa sitting in a rocking chair, gently easing red and swollen toes into a foot-bath; Santa checking his list; Santa lifting a candle... There were other animations as well, and a few non-moving dolls. (A Chik-fil-A cow wearing a Santa hat and carrying a sign exhorting us to "Eat more chikin" was one of the first things I noticed.) The floor was coated with at least three inches of thick, fluffy white cotton, I presume to hide all the wiring necessary for the display.
This house did more than glow. It shined, it glimmered, flashed, sparkled, twinkled, and glared. It sang, it blinked, it whistled, it laughed, it whirred, and it popped. It was supremely, astonishingly tacky.
And yet, looking at it, we couldn't feel superior in our good taste. All we could feel was awe - that someone could spend that much time putting together such a display; that someone could possibly have this much stuff; that anyone could possibly love the holiday this much. With shock and hysteria, we laughed and pointed out things that caught our eyes. We talked about calling the newspaper. We thought about taking pictures, or borrowing a video camera to capture the scene. We almost left a note for the owners, but no one had any paper. When we left, all the other tacky houses paled in comparison, and we soon headed home.
When we got back to their place, K.T. admitted to me that she was still stunned - but that she wasn't sure which overwhelming emotion had stunned her. The word she used to describe the house was "exuberence" I thought about it myself, driving home.
This house seemed to me to be a manifestation in the real world of the spirit of Christmas.
Okay, I know that sounds hokey. Stop laughing at me. I mean it.
It was bright and gaudy, and it didn't care. It wasn't trying to be in good taste; it seemed to transcend taste altogether. We love Christmas! this house shouted, And we don't care who knows it! And, Please! Share this magic with us! It sang - no, it carolled - with joy. It was overwhelming and busy and there was too much of it, and it laughed and said that a little bit of too much was a good thing once a year. Every time I looked, I saw something new that I'd missed before. I was impressed, thinking of all the work that had gone into putting this display together, and yet I knew, beyond any shadow of doubt, that every drop of sweat shed was pure love. It was the sheer excitement and ecstasy of the season distilled into one small yard.
When I go back (was there ever any doubt?) I will take with me a note of thanks to leave.
Because when we left that house, we were all of us in the Spirit of Christmas.
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