The Christmas Llama
The Christmas Llama
I have a problem with boredom; which is to say I get bored very easily; which is to say I have the attention span of an ADD spider monkey whose Ritalin has been spiked with PCP. I fear boredom almost as much as I fear death, so whenever I go anywhere that threatens even the slightest chance of downtime — ie, when I have to go get my hair cut, or return something at any large department store right after Christmas, or, god forbid, do anything at all at the MVA — then I usually bring along a backpack full of goodies to help me wile away the time: at least two books (the one I’m actually reading, and the really difficult one I claim to be reading to impress the chicks), some RPG handbook, music, snacks, a laser pointer, an electronic flashing disco dreidel, and, of course, my inflatable “pin the scandal on the politician” game (Republican edition). I invariably wind up using none of it, but they’re nice to have.
Unfortunately, there are certain events that are virtually guaranteed to bore one out of one’s mind but nevertheless forbid the possession or use of boredom aids: graduations (your own or other people’s), weddings (your own or other people’s), company all-hands meetings, to name a few. But the worst — by far the worst — are the annual church Christmas pageants.
I don’t spend much time in church, for various reasons, but I am expected to attend these annual rituals, in which the real meaning of Christmas (which, as far as I can tell, is “God forgives bad taste”) is wrapped up in a two-hour long confection of cute-as-a-button caroling children, canned manger scenes, dancing angels, declaiming prophets in loose beards, and irritating teenagers reciting hackneyed religious cant in hip new modern lingo that manages to both alienate the old and irritate the young.
This year’s was no different. Due to the departure of the church’s longtime music director and chief Christmas pageant designer, it was also less outrageously overdone than last year’s (no parade of nations, no paper mache B-52s dropping cross-shaped bombs of faith on crowds of unbelievers, no rollerblading saints orbiting the proceedings in skintight white leotards and fluttering gold wings whose tips trailed long tendrils of confetti) but no less boring. I sunk down into my chair and closed my eyes and prayed for the sweet oblivion of sleep.
But then a hush settled over the crowd, and I heard frenzied whispers from the people around me. I opened my eyes. And saw the llama.
The creature was being tugged down the aisle, not quite resisting, but not quite cooperating either. Its handler, a man dressed in shepherd’s clothing, was leading it towards a stage outfitted for the birth and unveiling of the Christ child: straw and stable, manger and mule, virgin and child. The llama swiveled its head on its absurdly long neck as it moved, scanning the assembled masses, and its eyes spoke of confusion and dismay and the first inklings of llamic outrage.
I ransacked my scant stores of biblical knowledge for any mention of llamas (or any equine creatures of South American descent) and came up empty. I’m no bible scholar, of course, but it seems to me that you’d be far more likely to run into camels than llamas in that part of the world. And that must have been it: the pageant organizers had decided that the show lacked a certain level of verisimilitude, that the audience just wasn’t going to buy it. It needed something special to reel the people in, something new, something exciting, something dromedary. It needed a camel.
Of course, camels are difficult to come by on the American continent, and two men dressed in a camel-suit wouldn’t have comported well with the air of kitschy gravitas that reigned over the proceedings like a sequined tabernacle. There was, however, a convenient solution, literally just down the road — a llama farm. Llamas are definitely not camels, but they are members of the camel family (camelids, to be precise), and, though they lack humps and desert experience, they’ll do in a pinch.
Now, I’m not sure why someone decided to start a llama farm in the middle of suburban Maryland, but Stranger Things Have Happened. In fact, they were happening at that moment. The handler had reached the front of the amphitheater and was trying to coax his charge up a little ramp onto the stage, but the llama had apparently decided that enough was enough. It swayed backwards, glaring haughtily at the little biped tugging at its bit. I could almost feel its mortification: Do you know who I am, sir? I am a llama, not some vacuous ruminant to be bandied around your ritual set like a helpless circus thrall. My species dates back to the fifth millennium B.C; my ancestors were bounding nimbly about the slopes of the Andes while your kind were still cowering in caves, huddling beneath hyena pelts and gnawing on rat carcasses. Damn you sir.
Meanwhile, onstage, more livestock had appeared. A sheep was standing peacefully beside the wise men, chewing amiably and staring out at the audience, as if we were a movie he was sort of enjoying. There was also a mule. The mule, being a mule, had decided that it wanted to stand directly in front of the manger scene, obscuring Mary and Joseph and their child. A shepherd was pulling at it with everything he had, his body bent into a crescent, his feet scrabbling against the hay scattered across the stage, but the mule was quite happy where it was. It had a great view.
And, for a moment, the proceedings stopped. The whirling Bethlehemites on stage were still whirling, and the music was still blaring, but the pageant was definitely in treadmill mode now, a lot of movement and no progress. Some rogue elements of the crowd began to titter, the actors looked at one another uncertainly, even the most devout among us began to fidget. Disaster was in the air.
But it wasn’t in the cards. The mule decided to move, the llama trudged reluctantly up the stage and glared at us balefully, sheering its head from side to side as wise men danced by bearing gifts, the sheep munched. The baby Jesus was unveiled. Gifts were presented. Adulation ensued.
And, as the show settled back into its frantic yet glacial pace, I settled back into my seat and closed my eyes, bored again, yet strangely content.
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