Final sleigh ride.

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Every collection of professionals has their own language and idiomatic expressions. Santa Claus and his helpers are possessed of a unique vocabulary, much of it rather secretive so as to keep the mystery alive. We’re not exactly Freemasonry but we do have some things we don’t say in public.

One thing we do talk about in public is “The final sleigh ride.” It is our way of saying that one of our brotherhood has passed away. When you attend some of our annual meetings you’ll hear a list read in remembrance of those gentlemen who have died in the previous year. It’s always a little sad, but part of the scenery when most of the people involved in the activity are over 60, heavyset, and sedentary (that chair kind of molds to your tuchus after a while.)

I have managed websites for some Santas over the years. It’s kind of fun seeing what they are up to from a professional standpoint. They do some interesting things and visit with lots of people. And they need me to keep the schedules current on the web page.

Over the last few years one of my customers has been Bob King of Aiken, South Carolina.

Santa Bob King

Bob would get mad at me on an annual basis because I’d forget to bill him for the site. It wasn’t a priority for me, I knew Bob was good for it and I wasn’t stressing about getting an invoice out. But he’d insist. Bob was that kind of guy. He wanted things done the right way – it comes with having personal honor.

This year I didn’t get any updates to the schedule via email. I didn’t think about it except at work around 2 in the morning. I wasn’t going to call Bob and risk waking him up, and I forgot to email him when I got home. After several weeks of thinking about it I finally remembered to send him an email. I figured I’d get a chastisement about billing and a schedule at the same time. I needed to get it done, Christmas is already upon most of us who are professional Santas.

After a week went by and I had no response I knew something was wrong. I went to the web page and dialed his cell phone (sleigh phone to the uninitiated) in hopes that I’d catch him before I went to bed. I got the dreaded message that Bob’s phone was disconnected.

I knew that was bad. Bob wasn’t the type to let details like paying the phone bill slip. So I googled him and found his obituary. I watched the video, sat and prayed for him a few minutes and then called his wife. She was very gracious about taking my call. Bob passed away just a short time ago and it’s certainly got to be a raw spot on her heart after 44 years of marriage. I let her know that I’d be leaving the website up with a memorial message if that was ok with her. It was. The website will go down at the end of the Christmas season. It seemed only fair to leave it up for a while because I know, and she reminded me, that Bob directed people there to check the schedule for availability. It seemed the best way to get the message out to his following.

Yes, every good Santa has a following. I know for a fact that people check my website regularly to see where I will be appearing. They call me when it’s not updated and they have a question. I appreciate that and look forward to their visits each year. It’s always humbling to be sitting in the chair at Midtown Global Market and have people bring their children by for the 5th, 6th, or 7th straight year of pictures with me. I’m a part of that child’s history. It’s an honor.

And this year, in Aiken and the surrounding area, Christmas will be a little less bright and cozy with the passing of a local Santa. The families who came to see him at Bass Pro Shop won’t be getting the continuity of pictures they had grown to expect. I’m sure the fellow who replaces him will grow into the role, but for now those boots seem awfully big and hard to fill.

Bob’s probably laughing about this from Heaven. He finally got me to send the first email in all these years and he wasn’t there to respond. I’m sure he’s hanging out with the original Saint Nicholas of Myra. The two of them comparing notes with some of the other legendary figures of Christmas about what they brought to the celebration of Christ’s birth. And above them all, Jesus is glad to have one of His better children home in Heaven.

I’ll be thinking about Bob when I visit this year. He was a gentle man and a good man. Who will you be thinking about this Christmas? Is there someone special in your life that won’t be there this year for the first time? Is it a special memory from your youth that you wish you could recapture? Or is it just the hope that Jesus’s birth will be important in how you live your life in the coming year?

Sorry, no restaurant review.

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But I promise to make up for it with the next few day’s posts. Once you read the next post you’ll understand why nothing big happened here on Wednesday.

Second, the subscriptions jumped by over 8 gazillion percent once I reminded you all of the used (but freshly laundered) bed sheet offer. I am a little concerned, however, about the salacious nature of some of the comments I received about those sheets. This is a Christian blog and we do have some standards. I may post the comments once I’m done laughing.

Third, anyone remember the week long torment on voice over work? I found this little gem tonight at BoingBoing.net and almost had a problem with hygiene. I am going to embed it here for your listening pleasure but if you click the link some of the comments are pretty funny. Warning: the comments on the linked page are NSFW and may offend some people.

A little set up before the audio: William Shatner goes off, in a very calm way, on a bad voice over director. Any actor who’s ever heard “Just do it like you think” and then get’s corrected understands his frustration in this clip. Any actor worth their paycheck wants direction. We all know that the people paying us have something in mind for tone and style when we walk on the set or into the booth. It’s really rough that you don’t guess what’s going on inside their head and have to redo it several times. I’m not complaining about the “evolving” session where things kind of morph on their own. I’m specifically talking about the case where they have no clue what they want and hope you’ll pull a rabbit out of the hat and save their bacon. That’s pretty rare in my limited experience. Most of the people I’ve worked for had a pretty good picture in their mind before the script ever hit the music stand in front of the microphone. But in this case they didn’t and Shatner is absolutely brutal. It’s seriously funny to listen to from an actor’s perspective.

As promised, the post tomorrow will be a good one. I just need a little longer to think about it before it goes up on the web. I owe it to the subject of the post and want to get it right.

Manana!

Remember to subscribe.

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If you don’t subscribe you can’t win the used bedsheets. It’s that simple.

So put your cursor on the upper right of this page and subscribe. It’s free, you get a daily update, you can always unsubscribe (but nobody has yet.)

And, there really will be some extra content for subscribers only down the road. Right now a beautiful set of freshly laundered micro-fiber sheets are up for grabs.

More later today, right now my enormous gut has a date with the exercise bike. Restaurant review later. See a connection?

Another fevered dream.

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This flu is still kicking my backside as of this entry being written. For the last few nights I haven’t slept very well. Hard to breathe, gippy tummy, vivid dreams.

Last night’s was a doozy, but it was an instructive one and I’m going out on a limb to analyze it here. I don’t place much stock in dreams as prophetic things or ways to understand your life. If that was the case I’d be flying an F-14 (yeah, I know, they’re gone but they were “my” airplane as a young man) and learning what it’s like to grow old with Raquel Welch since those were the two biggest dreams of my youth.

Back to the dream. I was in a huge church and for some reason I was pushed up out of the pews (commotion in the pews was not picked at random!) and into the orchestra area. Somebody handed me a saxophone. Why? I don’t know, don’t play that thing any better than the trumpet I carried around for years to placate my parents. But I did learn one thing in marching band – you don’t have to actually play the stupid thing if you march and fake it reasonably well on the valve fingering.

So there I was in the orchestra area faking my saxophone skills when a gentle presence asked why I wasn’t playing the instrument given to me? I gave some lame excuse about not knowing the “proper” way to play the sax. The presence departed and the song ended. In an instant there came a joyful noise from the loud speakers in the church – it was a song from my childhood – Rollin’ on a River by Creedence Clearwater Revival.

Link to Rollin’ on the River

Now, all due respect to Creedence, but it’s not a religious song by any means. And yet in my dream it was an expression of worship. The words soared and changed and became a testimony to God. I cried in the dream with pure joy. My voice was the one ringing out in the church. The orchestra and the saxophone were forgotten and it was just me talking to God with my uplifted voice.

I think that this is what my calling is as a Christian writer. To lift that voice, the skill God has given me, to his praise. Society handed me a trumpet and a saxophone. I don’t like to play either one and have just been faking it with them all these years. But I have a voice that will lift Him up to the Heavens in joy and that’s what I should be using.

So, today I will write. It’s what I’m called to do. It’s what brings me joy and allows me to use the special voice God has given me. Those rejection letters stacking up on the table? He didn’t send them. I will move forward.

What has He given you that you’re not using? Why are you still faking it with that silly saxophone when you could be exalting Him?

(update: I wrote this early last week right after the election. Over the course of the next three days I received two rejection letters from publishers. Both were extremely kind. I am told that of all the rejection letters you get from publishers these are about 3/4 of the way toward the prized, “We’d like to sign you” letter. One said they really weren’t doing any books like my proposal at this time. The other said my skill level wasn’t there yet. That’s cool. Both were nicely put and neither one was mean or demeaning.

I have to wonder if God was preparing me for that rejection. And it inspires me to continue onward and not give up the dream. I’m fine with being turned down here on Earth as long as when I get to the Gates of Heaven they nod and let me inside. Heck, they can even snicker or roll their eyes. Just let me in.)