I ♥ the misfits.

I originally posted this back in December of 2005. I'm still proud of it. I love the gay elf with the revealing name of Hermey (which was later redacted to Herbie, hm, wonder why) and the black, I mean red-nosed, reindeer. And, of course, the Island of Misfit toys, which as Jen Bayne points out, actually sound like a lot more fun than normal toys, I mean, who wouldn't want a cowboy who rides an ostrich?

I'm less satisfied than I was a few years back about the repentance theme at the end; sure, there's some personal repentance, but there's no systemic or structural change in the stratified society of the North Pole. And Hermey dances with a girl elf at the end (a girl elf? where were they, anyway, till the end scene where apparently they exist only to dance and ex-gay-ify Hermey?). Sigh. Well, maybe Hermey is bi. That would be all right. But Santa's still a dope; and the acceptance of Hermey and Rudolph at the end has the feel of a grand exception made in their individual cases on the basis of personal merit that symbolically covers over their misfitness.

And my reflections below don't even comment on the role of the "Bumble," whose very name is short for "abominable," the adjectival form of abomination--that which by definition must be obliterated and exiled from community in the name of purity--the Bumble's rehabilitation comes at the expense of a dramatic transformation of his nature, the removal of his teeth, the symbolic repository of his anger and violence and hatred; he is, in short, tamed. And by whom? The White Man, standing in as the paradigmatic civilized human, who in his own estimation, has colonized and owns the North and is determined to reap riches from it. ("Gold! Siiiiiiiilver!") I mean, wow. Awesome. [I think they must have cut the scene where Santa and Yukon Cornelius duke it out for the property rights to the North Pole...]

without further ado:

theological reflections on "Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer"

One of my favorite perennial Christmas classics is that edition of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer where Burl Ives narrates as Sam the Talking Snowman and sings. You know, the one where the little figurines move around jerkily but endearingly. (For some interesting info about this classic, click here.)

My favorite character in this thing is Hermey, the Elf who wants to be a dentist. Herbie reveals this sick unnatural ambition in a conversation with the Elf Boss, who lectures him threateningly:

Hermey, miserably: Not happy in my work, I guess.
Head Elf: WHAT??!
Hermey: I just don't like to make toys.
Head Elf: Oh well if that's all...WHAT??!! You don't like to make toys?!
Hermey: No.
Head Elf, to others: Hermey doen't like to make toys!
Others: (repeat it down down the line) and in chorus: Shame on you!
Head Elf: Do you mind telling me what you DO wanna do?
Hermey: Well sir, someday, I'd like to be...a dentist.
Head Elf: A DENTIST? Good grief!
Hermey: We need one up here...I've been studying it, it's fascinating, you've no idea, molars and bicuspids and incisors--
Head Elf: Now, listen, you. You're an elf, and elves make toys. Now get to work!

The ontology undergirding the Head Elf's reprimand of Hermey leaves no room for consideration of an elf who deviates from his "nature" by not liking to make toys. It's simply inconceivable. Hermey's attempt to "fit in" is stymied when, engrossed in the task of providing teeth for some dolls, he misses elf practice and suffers another confrontation with the Head Elf, which concludes with the Head Elf's vicious assertion, "You'll NEVER fit in!" Miserable, Hermey jumps out the window in self-imposed exile, his only option to be true to himself.

Rudolph's situation is parallel. Born with the disgusting congenital deformity of a red glowing nose, his parents are horrified (even his own mother can only weakly offer, "we'll have to overlook it," while his father goes so far as to actually hide it by daubing mud on his son's face.) Later, at the "reindeer games," Rudolph outshines the other reindeer in skill, but when his prosthesis falls off, everyone gasps and his erstwhile playmates mock and shun. The authority figures echo this attitude: the Coach gathers everyone up and leads them away, saying loudly, "From now on, we won't let Rudolph join in any of our reindeer games!"

Santa's role throughout most of the cartoon is to legitimize the prejudices against the misfits already evident in lesser members of the Christmastown community. When Santa visits the newly birthed Rudolph, his unthinking prejudice becomes plain when he comments that Rudoplh had better grow out of it if he ever wants to be on his team of flying reindeer. Santa's behavior at the scene of the reindeer games is even more disturbing; like his pronouncement at Rudolph's birth, he says, "What a pity; he had a nice takeoff, too." For Santa, Rudolph's skill is less important than his nose, an arbitrary physical attribute. A distant and authoritarian figure, Santa is unaware of Hermey's plight (apparently the welfare of elves is beneath his notice) and condemning of Rudolph's gall in considering himself a reindeer of the same worth and dignity as the others.

Rudolph and Hermey get together, and a few lines of their "misfit theme song" are revealing:

"We're a couple of misfits, we're a couple of misfits--
What's the matter with misfits?
That's where we fit in.

We may be different from the rest...
But who decides the test
of what is really best?"

In "Christmastown," those who decide "the test of what is really best" seem to be the tyrannical and thoughtless majority, reinforced by authoritarian sanction by Santa, the pseudo-benevolent despot. Those who question the status quo--those who are already marginalized--are mocked, punished, and driven out of the community.

Over the years it's become apparent to me that this simple children's cartoon contains some real subversive elements: Hermey's misfit-ness is the result of apparent "choice," but the kind of choice where the alternatives are to be true or false to oneself. Rudolph's misfit-ness is the result of birth rather than choice. Change "dentist" to "gay" and "red nose" to "black skin." Now the subversive message is clear: Santa is racist, the Head Elf and the elf community is homophobic, and "Christmastown" is really "Whiteytown."

Given this subtext, the change of heart on the parts of Santa and the Head Elf at the end are more than just the formulaic ending to a well-known Christmas fable. Although it takes a prodigious feat of community service on both Hermey's and Rudolph's parts (each requiring skills peculiar to their misfit-ness) to bring the authorities and the community to repentance, repentance is indeed the note sounded in the conclusion. Everyone, including Santa, apologizes to the misfits. And in the end, difference is valorized rather than exiled.

Christmas, knitting, and Wii

My determination to knit all my Christmas gifts wasn't enough for me to actually complete them all exactly on time. I owe Elliott another fingerless mitt (unless he has some dreadful accident requiring amputation of an arm in the next few weeks) and my dad his fuzzy slippers. But on the whole it was a lot of fun to knit gifts for everyone and I'm very pleased with the slippers. Here's a pic of how they turned out (credit to Malda for being my foot model).

Here are a few more gratuitous pics from our Christmas, and a priceless video of my Mom and Dad playing tennis on Em and Elliott's Wii (note how my mother shamelessly gloats at the end).

me, Brent, Leroy, Malda and Clare at Rockefeller Center

Brandon's hat & mitts, knit by yours truly

Clare hugs her baby doll

Clare loves her baby doll!

Mom's gift to herself (photo by Em)

stockings were hung by the chimney with care...see Clare's stocking on the left? and mine so heavy the loop broke and it's on the hearth behind Dad...

Emily. Loves. Butterscotch.

only decent pic of me all season. Nifty hat & scarf, right? I'm not the only Christmas knitter around...Thanks Ma!

Scrooge: the rich man and Lazarus re-written

In my Christmas Cartoon Canon, alongside Grinch, Charlie Brown and Rudolph (all three of which Richard Beck at Experimental Theology has posted on in a lovely series on Christmas cartoon theology), is Mister Magoo's Christmas Carol. There are multiple classic versions of this Dickens story, of course, and the Muppet version is also part of the canon.

The Magoo version stands out for several reasons: there is a lot of dialogue verbatim from the original Dickens story, a possibly off-color pun on the name Dick at one point, occasional jokes worked in about Magoo's nearsightedness, and a quite extended scene with "the laundress, the charwoman and the undertaker" (see below)--an element quite often deleted from adaptations of the story as it is both narratively superfluous and kind of gruesome. (I inevitably wonder every time I see this part of the cartoon about the implications for estate sale practitioners...) And the whole third ghost sequence is undeniably kindof scary for a kid's cartoon. (Not a cartoon for Sophia, Joe!)



But mainly what I've been wondering lately is how deliberate Dickens might have been in crafting this story as a retelling of Jesus' story about the rich man and Lazarus the beggar. Remember that one? The rich guy ignores Lazarus, begging at his gate, and then they both die and in the afterlife are separated by an uncrossable chasm; the rich man, now in hell and who therefore understands that he should have been a lot better person, asks that someone go talk some sense into his five brothers so they don't end up in hell too. And the answer comes back: if they haven't listened to Moses and the prophets to begin with, neither will they be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.

And of course, that's the exact plot of Dickens' Christmas Carol: Marley comes back from the dead with a message to Scrooge to repent, or else. And Scrooge listens. And so the Carol is a mirror image of Jesus' story, where the answer is essentially a denial of the possibility of a Scrooge repentance. If Scrooge hasn't listened to Moses and the prophets, why should he listen to Marley and the three ghosts?

It's a hard answer and one I don't really like. I prefer the Dickens story, with the optimism and hope that everyone, even the most hardened and greedy and awful of us, can change given the chance...and that that chance will always be there. I guess the question is, which one is more true to life?

christmas tree

I'm not one of those people who thinks the day after Thanksgiving is the mandatory time for pulling out the Christmas decor, or who hums carols to herself all day long, or whatever. I have been watching Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer more or less constantly since last Christmas, but that's Clare's fault. I was totally horrified one night, nearly a full week before Halloween, to see that the local Duane Reade already had a Christmas display up in one of its shop windows.

But I do love Christmas trees.

Our tree is a pathetic $16 Wal-Mart fake we bought the first year we were married, nothing to get real happy about. I hope next year we will finally be settled enough and have space enough (wherever we are) to upgrade to some kind of decent Christmas tree. I am totally envious of people who can buy one of the gorgeous, sweet-smelling real trees they're selling just outside the seminary. (I am going to console myself by purchasing a $10 wreath.)

But I love our Christmas tree anyway, even though it is a dreadful fake that sheds plastic bits, has a broken stand, is consequently precariously wobbly, and was purchased long ago from The Evil Empire. Because our Christmas tree, like the very best Christmas trees anywhere, is totally ours.

We have three "first Christmas together" ornaments (this is what happens when you get married a week before Christmas). These are always the first things on the tree. Our basic glass ornament sets--in gold and white--are from the tree we decorated for our wedding reception, and these are the next things on the tree. Then the antique ornaments from Brent's mom, Malda, from her own treasured store of beautiful things gathered from estate sales over the years: Brent's favorite, a little elf that sits in a nook (or a cranny, depending on my mood), an antique glass ornament, a little rocking horse, assorted Santas, and my favorites, a pair of pink glass clip-on birds that perch jauntily on the ends of branches. A picture frame ornament, from my Aunt Nancy, with Clare's Christmas picture from last year in it. A set of Charlie Brown Christmas ornaments I bought last year while shopping with Ally. Some dainty woven ornaments that Sarah & Andrew gave away as party favors at last year's Christmas bash. A set of little Chinese dolls from keyrings that I don't remember acquiring in China that make much better tree ornaments than keyrings...

Underneath our tree this year is a quite respectable collection of Christmas storybooks (especially considering Clare doesn't read yet), all gifts from people who love her. And a beautiful white plush teddy bear in red scarf and stocking cap, her "Mimi bear." But no presents. And there won't be many, this year. But--except for the fact that my eye is of course trained to behold Christmas trees without presents underneath as "naked"--that's not the point of Christmas trees. It's all about the history--what each little item says about who we are, and where we've been, and who we love and who loves us.

I love that on my parents' Christmas tree there are still, every year, things from our childhood. The ceramic mouse ornament that I cast and painted in the 6th grade. The drummer boy drum Ally made in 4th grade (that has Denessa's name on it too from when she tried to steal it). The preschool picture of Emily glowering at the camera like she wanted to shoot the photographer in the butt with a BB gun. I can't wait till Clare gets old enough to start making hideous additions to our Christmas tree history every year. I want the construction paper, the scribbles, the glitter, the smeary glue, the sullen I-won't-smile-for-you-right-now pics, all of it. And I especially want an elf head with a scary crooked grin and a paper clip hook stuck in him sideways, made out of dried playdough.