Once upon a time (because all of these tales have to begin with that, don't they?) there was a little boy. He was in the third grade when his school decided, in the middle of the year, that he should be in fourth grade instead because they thought he was so smart that he was bored in third grade. From then on, he was always a year or so younger -- and more importantly, less mature -- than the other kids in his class, and it was really tough. Grade-wise he was able to keep up, but when it came to making friends and such, that didn't really happen at all.
(Let's drop the third-person narrative now. Of course, this is about me.)
Flash-forward to a few years later. I think I was in 7th or 8th grade. One of those "My Weekly Reader" type publications had a short Christmas play in it, and our teacher decided that our class would perform the play for the 1st- and 2nd-grade kids right before schools shut down for the holidays. So she was asking who wanted to play various roles -- elves, reindeer, etc. For some unknown reason --
and remember that I was really not outgoing at all -- I spoke up and said, "I can play Santa."
I thought I was joking. The teacher thought otherwise.
The play was a bit of a satire in which Santa was feeling overwhelmed. Inflation caused the price of reindeer feed to skyrocket, the elves were threatening to go on strike, the FAA was trying to ground his sleigh (or they were trying to shoot him out of the sky thinking it was a UFO), stuff like that. So it begins with Santa, in full costume, looking into a mirror and trying to work up the Christmas spirit...
(Low voice, spoken calmly) "Ho, ho, ho." (A little louder, a little more upbeat) "Ho, ho, ho!" (Really loud, like the Santa we all know and love) "HO!! HO!! --" Santa abruptly grabs the hat from his head and flings it away, wailing, "Ohhhh, what's the use? I can't do it!" or words to that effect, and goes on about his problems. Of course, it all works out in the end somehow.
So on the big day, we were going to go from room to room and do this little play four or five times. We went into the first classroom, and I, dressed as Santa, went to my spot to begin. I think there was a mirror set up on a desk or something. (Very minimalist set.) Anyway, I began: "Ho, ho, ho...Ho, ho, ho!...HO!! HO!! -- Ohhhh, what's the use?" And I grabbed that hat from my head and I fired that sucker...
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| In case you can't tell, the t-shirt says, "NO, NO, I SAID ELVES...SEND ME FIFTY ELVES!" |
...and the fake beard I was wearing went right along with it.
You know how Charlie Brown brought back that scrawny little Christmas tree and (after calling him stupid, hopeless, etc.) everyone laughed at him? Imagine that laughter from everyone in the classroom, but directed at me. For, like, five minutes. Finally, because we didn't have a lot of time since we were going from room to room, we just skipped to the end.
Needless to say, I was mortified, and it was worse when everyone wanted me to do the same thing the rest of the day in every other classroom! I refused, though. The rest of the day the play went on as planned.
So, what's the moral of this story?
When someone wants volunteers be in a play where a fake beard is part of the costume, KEEP YOUR MOUTH SHUT!
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