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Frank Cotolo
December 5, 2013 |
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A long, long time ago, maybe even three "longs," a little boy named Timmy lived in a little town
named Town with his family and two arbitrary people. Timmy helped his family with financial support
by having a job after school. He worked at the Town General Store, owned by Mr. Guy, and he gave
his parents every penny he earned, even though something was strange about his parents.
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Timmy, who was 11 years old, noticed when Timmy was five years old that his parents looked like
different people every day. One day his father, Joe, was tall and thin and his mother, Molly, was
short and fat. The next day they exchanged those shapes. The following day they stayed in the
shapes from the previous days but both had beards. Then another day they were Chinese and another
day they had rabbit ears. Timmy accepted it, knowing that no matter what his parents looked like,
they loved him, so he helped them with money.
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Every December, Timmy worked extra hours so he could buy a Christmas tree and decorations for his
family and the arbitrary people in his home. Joe would never make enough to buy anything for
Christmas because Joe's job paid him so little money. Joe was a Stealth-bomber repairman and there
was not a calling for that in the town named Town because the aircraft was built elsewhere, in a
place that Joe and Molly could not afford to go because Joe, a Stealth-bomber repairman, could not
get enough work plying his trade in Town.
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Molly did not work because she thought she did not have command of her fingers. It was a
psychosomatic condition but it hampered her use of her hands, which, for all due purposes, were
needed to do any job that offered a salary. As for the arbitrary people in their home, these
fellows, sometimes ladies, hardly helped around the house at all, and by "hardly" I mean never. So,
if there were to be Christmas decorations, it was up to Timmy.
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But once Timmy turned 34 and nothing had changed in his life, he became bitter about Christmas and
that December he decided not to buy any decorations.
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"I'm through with Christmas," Timmy told Joe and Molly and the two arbitrary people who lived in
their house. "I make everyone else feel great and no one does anything for me. Here I am,
thirty-four years old and still working in the Town General Store. I have never even seen a Stealth
fighter and I didn't go to college because Town doesn't have a college and I didn't move from this
town called Town. I am not married, don't have a girlfriend or a wife or both and all is
meaningless to me."
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"We're sorry you feel that way," said his father, Joe, who looked like The Lone Ranger at the time.
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That night Timmy went to sleep and was awoken by a man with wings. Timmy was happy to see something
different for a change (first he checked, though, to make sure it wasn't his father looking like a
man with wings).
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"I am an angel," the man with wings said, "and I have come to tell you that Christmas is a spirit
of the heart, not a decoration."
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"That's easy for you to say," Timmy said. "You have probably seen a Stealth fighter and went to
college and have a wife or a girlfriend of both and..."
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"Shut up," the angel said. "Just listen to me and get this through your head. There is a spirit in
your heart and that is Christmas and you should be in touch with that spirit all the time, not just
in December. One more thing."
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"What?"
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"Don't let arbitrary people live with you. Stick to your family."
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"All right."
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The angel flew off and Timmy went to sleep. But the next day things were different. Timmy had Joe
help him toss out the arbitrary people who lived in their house, told Molly her fingers worked so
she could, too, made a deal with Mr. Guy to take over the Town General Store, turned it into a
Stealth aircraft parts factory, put his father in charge of the Stealth aircraft parts factory,
asked a girl of legal age who lived in Town to marry him, got a girlfriend too, and decorated Town
with all the money he made from doing all of those things.
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Timmy maintained that spirit throughout the year and Town became a city named Town City and it
became obvious what one miserable soul could do for mankind and the world if only he had the spirit.
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The End
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Cotolo can be found hosting the talk and interview programme
Cotolo
Chronicles. You can send him an e-mail at this address:
frank@148.ca.
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