To everything, there is a season…

And I totally stick to this. Completely.

Meaning, I’m the type that doesn’t even want to think about Christmas (the decorations, the carols, the movies, even shopping) until well after the turkey has been carved.

This year, I passed a house with a roof trimmed in lights and a decorated tree proudly displayed in the front window. It was October. A little excessive, don’t ya think?

But this is socially acceptable. Someone puts up a skeleton a minute before October 1^st, and it’s a crime. They’re automatically labeled a “weirdo.”

I guess it goes both ways. But, all the same, putting up a Christmas tree before Black Friday doesn’t cut it for me.  I’m not a Scrooge by any means, just being practical.

Yes, I do have seasonal rules I follow. It’s in my makeup. So much as seeing a combination of strictly red and green M&M’s in November, it kinda throws me into a tailspin.

But this year, however, was an exception of sorts.

I found it especially difficult to follow these hard and fast seasonal rules, considering we now have a “Holiday Cheermeister” in the family. I’m still not sure how it happened, but it would be the little five-year-old “Tiny Tim” of our clan that kinda changed things up a bit this year.  

On a warm and sunny autumn afternoon, sometime shortly after Halloween, my daughter pulled up in our driveway with my five-year-old grandson. He was hanging out of the sunroof joyfully singing along to Bing Crosby’s, “It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas.”

Uh, NO. IT WASN’T!

I stopped what I was doing and approached the car.

“What’s going on here?”

“It’s Christmas!” he excitedly replied. My daughter giggled.

The Jack-O-Lanterns were still fresh on the front porch, and this was not okay!

Apparently, no one prompted the tot to do this (I have reason to believe this has to be accurate, as my daughter clearly knows better).

Yes, this did throw me off. And yes, I did protest.  

But how could I scold a cute little five-year-old who insisted on sporting Christmas attire the first week in November?

He was quickly forgiven. And, after about a week or so, I adapted. However, I did stand firm that in my house, by golly, it was still November, and on my turf, the Pilgrims, Indians, and turkeys held precedence.

Then, he asked to turn on Christmas music. There on my turf.  And he didn’t just ask, he begged.

It was right about then when I thought it absolutely appropriate to lash out with Ebenezer’s famous quote. But, I refrained.

Surprisingly enough, (and maybe it’s always like this, I’d never know) XM radio had jumped on the early Christmas bandwagon, too.

As I was cooking dinner in the kitchen, and my grandson was busy frolicking in the invisible snow he and Burl Ives had created in the living room, something strange began to happen.

Visions, not of sugar plums but of Christmases past, flashed in my mind. As the ambient and familiar songs drifted through the house, they carried back in time, the way only music can do. As crazy as it was, it was almost as if the songs were in chronological order, like I was stuck in my own version of the Dicken’s classic.

First, there was Charley Pride’s “O Holy Night.”

In an instant, I was a small human, much around the age of the “Cheermeister” himself.  

Music billowed from our house’s upper loft as my mom played it on our “contemporary” white stereo turntable, which I often used as a space station for my Barbies.  

I remember the album cover sitting propped up on a nearby table, much like a family portrait. It was a picture of a young Mr. Pride standing beside a tree, decked out in a bright red Santa getup minus the beard. The album was as much of our Christmas décor as the tree.

As the record spun around, our fireplace-lit living room was filled with all the warm and mellow tones of Charley Pride Christmas wonder. I distinctly remember falling asleep to that album on many a Christmas Eve.

Next up was Bruce Springsteen’s “Santa Claus is Coming to Town.”

I left my warm and cozy childhood living room and was quickly jolted into the busy and bustling world of working Christmas season retail.

I’m in my early twenties, standing behind a counter in the middle of a crowded mall store that caters to outfitting young females that either: (A) are starring in an upcoming music video, (B) already have their hands on backstage passes to the next Motley Crue concert tour, or (C) aspire to accomplish either (A) and/or (B) in their very near future.

And each one of these young female customers lacks Christmas cheer. Because of this, our store’s company provided a seasonal 8 track Christmas tape that we were to play all day, every day, over and over, at high enough decibels to help induce that lacking spirit of the season. 

Amid the crowded store and the catfight that was happening in front of a clothes rounder as a pair of our customers battled it out over the last black pleather skirt for $9.99, Bruce blared through the speakers asking Clarence over the magical sounds of jingle bells if he’d been rehearsing “real hard” in hopes of Santa bringing him a new saxophone.

In the meantime, my colleagues and I battle questions in the checkout line, such as, (this one’s for you, Elizabeth) “How much are your 3 for $5 panties if you just get one pair?”

The line of about fifty angry customers wait behind as she (or he) carefully pans over all three panties before deciding not only to go ahead and get all three, but to add two more.

“Now, how much would it be for all five?”

My logical response is, “Why not get six and save yourself some money?” (And, of course, the hassle of me trying to figure out how to ring up five versus tapping one button on the register to promo all six.)

She (or he) contemplates this. “But I really just want the five…”

Me, being the savvy selling retail clerk that I was, reaches over to the nearby panty table. I show the customer a pair of black lace thongs, suggesting this sleazy sixth pair would serve as a perfect slingshot for that hard-to-buy-for nephew on their list.  

“Just go out back, gather up a few stones, package it all up real nice, and Voila! He’ll be the envy of every sixth-grade slingshot-toting boy around!”

Interactions such as these were conveyed through yells as Springsteen doubted whether his live audience’s and our customer’s behavior had been good enough. He then warns that we all, “Better watch out!”

I’m not totally convinced the Christmas tape I had to listen to, over, and over, and over again, really served as anything more than a soundtrack to the chaos that was happening all around me. By the end of those long December days of retail, I was usually as out of breath as Mr. Springsteen sounded by the end of that song. Still, I wouldn’t trade those times for anything.

And then it came on, almost right on cue.

As I was finishing up cooking dinner and the “Cheermeister” was still dancing around the room trying to include the two ginger cats in his holiday celebration, the Christmas song that evokes more conflicting emotions in me than all others combined, started to play.

It was the Johnny Mathis version.

 My eyes darted over to the XM radio. Stunned, I saw “We Need a Little Christmas” spelled out in the radio’s blue illuminating lights. There’s always that initial shock hearing it for the first time every year that gets me. 

My sweet little grandson slowly stopped his gleeful dancing, and his face dropped when he looked over in my direction. Even the Cheermeister, at his very young age, could tell something was not right. This one particular song, that seemed ever-so-cheery, had obviously summoned up something deep within in his grandmother that was far from cheerful.

I forced a makeshift smile and turned back to my cooking as he, reluctant at first, went back to his premature holiday celebrating.

  The beginning of that song is always joyful, even for me, and even considering the plaguing memory behind it.

“MY daughter has been asked to perform in our church’s Christmas Cantata!” I boasted to the mothers of my daughter’s four best friends. All five girls had danced since the age of three and were now, as middle-schoolers, on a competition dance team together.

Along with competition dance teams, come competition dance moms, and competition dance moms can be crazy, at least the majority of them. I’m allowed to say this because I was one of them, one of the crazies.

Three of the four moms all looked at me with idle glares.

“Yes!” I went on, “She’s been asked to choreograph her own tap routine and perform it at the beginning of the show!”

This, in the realm of a competition dance mother, was quite an accomplishment. 

“Well then,” said the non-crazy mom of our bunch, who was a positive addition to our group and balanced out all the craziness. “We will all just have to go and support her! It will be fun!”

Being the proud competition dance mom that I was, I didn’t hesitate to announce to all the dance studio this great honor that had been bestowed upon my daughter. Also, I was on a quest to borrow a 1950’s poodle skirt costume for the occasion. My daughter worked hard on her cutesy little tap routine, and, before long, her black tap shoes were cleaned, polished, and my dancing darling was ready to go!

Performance night had arrived.

I sat in the darkened audience beaming with pride, and, regardless of the competitive nature we all tried so hard to conceal, I was surrounded by the support of my dance mom friends. My daughter’s best friends sat in the front row ahead of us cheering her on.

This is the happy image that always enters my mind in the song’s intro, way before Johnny Mathis or Percy Faith or whomever else starts “Hauling out the holly.”

No matter how hard I tried to fight them that evening, the proud mom tears started to flow. I had no doubt, if there happened to be a visiting talent scout in our church’s audience that night, my daughter would surely be on Broadway by spring the following year! All was just perfect as the sounds of her taps precisely clicked and clacked in sync to the joyful carol we all know and love!

But this was about to change in a matter of seconds.

In the very beginning, I’m guessing my vision must have been clouded by those tears of pride. Once I was handed a tissue and gained my composure, my heart dropped.

At first, I thought it was just an after-effect of my blurry, post-proud mom vision and that surely, my eyes were playing tricks on me.

Unfortunately, this was not the case.

Right around the time the choir was happily “Slicing up the fruitcake,” I came to realize that my daughter’s adorable little borrowed poodle skirt was slowly slipping further and further down her waistline with every little hop, step, and shuffle.

Surely, surely my daughter felt this happening. But, all the while, she kept on hopping, stepping, and shuffling as hard as ever.

In the world of competition dance, they are taught the show must go on, regardless of minor costume mishaps. But this wasn’t a headpiece tilting to one side or a hat flying off. This was way worse.

‘Stop! Stop NOW!’  I screamed at her telepathically, but nothing changed. I watched in horror as the skirt continued to inch downward.

Maybe no one else could tell, I told myself.

“Oh… my… stars…”

This came from the non-crazy dance mom of our bunch. I looked over at all of them, and they were as pale as I was. At that point, I think we had all stopped breathing.

Each one of my dance mom friends knew, in that moment, that, very easily, it could have been any one of their daughters up there on stage. The friend on my right squeezed my hand. It was as if we were all united in prayer in an effort to stop gravity from succumbing to its natural forces.

Now, this song is right around two minutes, regardless of who’s singing it. And the “Slicing of the fruitcake” happens right around the half-way mark. This meant there was well over another minute left. And there my daughter was, still hopping and shuffling away, the skirt continuing to drop.

I took a deep breath.

I was probably overreacting. We were competition dance moms, for crying out loud! Our eyes were trained to see things like this! No one else probably even noticed.

Maybe, just maybe, everyone was so blown away with my daughter’s talented performance, the fact that her elastic-waisted skirt was lowering by the second didn’t even phase them. I thought I had convinced myself of this until I saw one of the choir ladies standing directly behind my tapdancing daughter. As she joyfully sang, her eyes periodically shifted from the audience to my daughter’s backside. It was then that I knew we were in trouble.

With less than a minute to go, I hurriedly mouthed the rest of the lyrics in hopes of rushing the song to a quick end. It didn’t work.

The skirt now barely hung in an uneven state on her hip bones.

I prayed it would stay put, that somehow it would remain clinging for just a half a minute more. The seconds dragged on like a never-ending nightmare.

There was nothing I could do. I had no choice but to sit there and watch—a form of competition dance mom torture.

I was motionless, again unable to breathe for fear of anything my lungs could possibly produce from two rows back that might aid in the skirt’s descending drop.

It was going to happen. Right there, onstage, in front of our whole church congregation and their visiting friends and families, even the hopeful talent scout. It was inevitable.

As we all gathered together to rejoice in celebrating Jesus’s birth, my daughter’s skirt would plummet to the floor in front of all of them. I had to come to terms with this.

“For we need a little music! Need a little laughter! Need a little singing, ringing through the rafter!” 

We needed this song to be over! Now! Please, God!

As I sat on the edge of my seat while the last few seconds of the song seemed to play out in slow motion, I tried to look on the bright side.

One day, in the very distant future, this would be funny, I said to myself. After all the counseling, anyway.

Christmas is a time for miracles.

Miraculously, the poodle skirt managed to stay gripped to the lowest possible unrevealing point on her body, up until the song’s ending note and the lights went to black.

 I was the first to give a standing ovation, not for reasons that may have been obvious to others, but for praising God that He had gotten us through the longest two-minute Christmas carol I’d ever experienced.

 May you find the joy, humor, and lessons in all God’s miracles this holiday season. And may the little bit of Christmas we all need every day find you, all year long.

Many thanks to my daughter for the screenshot and text which inspired this story.