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GUEST EDITOR'S NOTES
THE COSMIC RETIREMENT
OF AQENT SANTA CLAUS
Immediate dispatch
from Qalactic HQ:
Discamate Entity Agency
Division, Supervisor,
Voice-System Log
Agent Santa Claus was getting old. 1 tried
to help him out in these last few solar-days
when that discamate entity finally ap
proached forced retirement.
1 must say, he seemed to be losing his abili
ties. Well, to be blunt, he was incompetent.
He had a lot of heart, though, 1 tell you. He
gave 100 percent all the time. Except for those
nasty stretches of depression which seemed
to occur more often in the final years.
I was his supervisor. Never had to stay on
his back. If anything, he gave too much of
himself. The Earthlings always were on the
greedy side, for the most part. Santa kept giv
ing and they kept taking. Oh, maybe they
would appear satisfied for a short while, but
that was such a transient attitude. 1 think
some of the more primitive Earthlings called
this “evolution.” Or something like that, any
way — I never was good on the details.
Well, I digress. What I was saying, simply
enough, is that Claus was feeling the pres
sure. He couldn’t decide who to make happy
— the Earthlings or his up-line management
team. And you don’t last long in this busi
ness if you rub the boss man the wrong way.
I know this sounds terribly hard-hearted,
but 1 have to survive too, you know. As you
know, 1 don’t run th? ‘King. Sometimes a
discamate entity hiu co do some things lie
doesn’t want to do.
It hurts me to remember the day when we
had to start putting the heat on Claus. He
was just bustin’ his behind, trying to make
those Earthlings happy. Not may of our agents
have ever kept up that kind of pace for long.
We usually transfer them to another planet,
or another dimension, or kick them upstairs.
But not Claus. He refused, I mean totally re
jected my generous offer to transfer him. He
said something about the Earth being a spe
cial project with him and he wasn’t going to
quit just because things were tough. 1 mean,
man, I’m starting to think at the time that
this Claus is a masochist, or something, you
know? But I realize now, the guy just had a
strong drive to succeed. He never was a quit
ter. Just didn’t know when to cut bait; he’s
probably got one of those “co-deptndency”
hang-ups.
Now, before you get any wrong ideas, I’ll
tell you right now that I don't have one dad-
gum thing against those Earthlings. A lot of
them are pretty sharp, really. They saw the
snow job, no pun intended. But the Earth
lings always sensed the bull that Claus and
our other agents threw’ at them. Earthlings
give a lot of lip service to phrases like “Peace
on Earth and Good Will Towards Men,” and
concepts like a “giving spirit" and “compas
sion,” but they prove time and time again that
they’re not going to fall for that. They seemed
to think that Santa’s sleigh was a Trojan horse,
or something.
Funny thing — back in the old days —
let me tell you about it. I’d get to talking with
Claus, and he’d tell me about his propaganda
plans and his foreign-a : d plans and his reha
bilitation programs, and I’d just swallow it
myself. I mean, the way he’d look at you
(metaphorically speaking), you’d think he
really thought he could puli it all off.
It really hurts me to let go of that kind of
agent. I’m glad w r e have such a good retire
ment plan. He’ll get plenty of rest, just the
right thing for an agent who went through so
much.
I remember the beginning of the end for
Santa. His big plans just weren’t coming close
to fulfillment. A lot of Earthlings stopped
believing in him. Well, he knew that it didn’t
matter if they believed in him as an individual
— he never was one for being too proud —
but Santa wanted the Earthlings to believe
in his dream. Just his dream. That’s all he
wanted.
But people even stopped believing in the
dream. That’s when Claus took that last-
ditch, desperate gamble. He assumed physi
cal form! Don’t ask me about the technicali
ties involved w’ith that, now. I just run the
show in this department. I delegate the de
tails to the discamate entities under me.
Well, anyway, Santa became directly in
volved, and you know what? The Earthlings
rejected him. Yeah, that’s right! How’’s that
for gratitude, I tell you. How’s that for — I'll
say it, damn it — how’s that for hypocrisy. The
only thing I can figure out is that the Earth
lings didn’t want Santa’s dream. What they
say they want and what they really want are
two different things.
Well, I now this part of my dispatch is
getting thick. 1 apologize and I’ll try to be
concise, but there Earthlings just irritate the
heck out of me. They have the gall to think
that they can come up wi r h a better dream
than one of our most experienced agents. The
unmitigated gall! The conceited, ignorant
savages still inhabit physical form! Like ani
mals, mind you, like animals, and some of
them presume to have the capabilities to chal
lenge our best agents. Well, from now on, it’s
their show. They can have it to do what they
want with it. No more agents, period.
Well, I know you want me to go ahead and
end this dispatch, so I’ll hurry up with the story.
Guess that’s my hang-up, getting nostalgic.
Why, I'd probably be crying now, if I had eves.
You see, the clincher was that the incidents
where the Earthlings were openly hostile to
Claus were actually :n the minority, really. The
clincher — the dadgummed thing that finished
him off — was that the Earthlings ignored him:
him and his dream. That’s right. They just ig
nored him. We have agents exploring this phe
nomenon right now. I mean, you'd think these
Earthlings would try to come up with their own
dream if they didn’t like Santa’s, but they’re
just coasting in some sort of neutral, incom
prehensible limbc.
Shut the whole place down because it’s sim
ply unmanageable? That might be rushing
things a bit, this talk of shutting the Earth
down. Let them muddle on through this mess
they’ve got themselves in.
Merry Christmas, then. Merry Christmas.
End of official dispatch.
K. Scott Coe
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