Casual
SKINNER, DAVID
Casual CRÈCHE AND BURN In one Christmas memory of mine all the kids and parents are finishing dessert. I light a cigarette. A particularly outspoken relative, who's been bossing the conversation...
...that the expectation of joy and fellowship will be followed, hard, by disappointment...
...Elegant but heartbroken...
...I also have loads of happy Christmas memories with appropriate musical accompaniment...
...Does one of them try to steal money from the others...
...I must seem disrespectful of my old classmate's storytelling skills, because minutes later he stands up and says (if I may paraphrase) that I am seriously lacking in Christmas spirit...
...Yeah, but do they disagree over how the money's divided...
...The confetti showers of wrapping paper as I and my five siblings tore our way through Santa's gifts, Bing Crosby on the turntable...
...That's what so messed up...
...The song is by Joey Ramone (the late, great leader of the punk band the Ramones), and it's my new favorite Christmas song, which I am grateful to have found...
...I have no experience writing screenplays, and tell him so several times, but he is undeterred, so I play along and try to hear more of the story...
...I escape a season's beating when our cop friend tells him to stop being a dumb drunk...
...You know, it's got to be like"—he puts his hand over his heart—"real...
...But how does the story play out...
...But then I put Joey Ramone on the CD player and try to remember what's most important: the fact that I don't want to fight tonight...
...Later that night, I listen to this other guy I went to school with—not a dealer, an addict—rattle on about an idea he has for a screenplay...
...Everyone should have a favorite Christmas song...
...Well, how do they go from being friends to not being friends...
...I reply, "No more than the voices of opinionated old men...
...A lot like Nick...
...It's, like, real...
...They're not playing...
...Those holy moments of standing at midnight mass, the delicate thrums of "Little Drummer Boy" in the air...
...I dunno," he says, irritated...
...Who are these guys and how does their friendship break down...
...The three of them are hanging out together...
...It's about some friends who win the lottery together but are torn apart— he says with much rueful head-shak-ing—by greed...
...A particularly outspoken relative, who's been bossing the conversation all night, says he's read that cigarette smoke can damage children's hearing...
...And my hometown is nothing like Hollis, Queens...
...He's drunk, and taken with the notion that I am going to write the script for him...
...That enchanting A Charlie Brown Christmas, with its lonely piano, as I and my two brothers watch from the couch in the old family house...
...For the next four years, the blow-hard refuses to attend any family function where I might make an appearance...
...You don't get it...
...They don't make TV specials with scenes like the ones that fill my Christmas memories (or, to be fair, 'i with characters like me...
...cool and perfect...
...Mine used to be "Christmas in Hollis" by Run DMC, even though, unlike the mom in the song, mine never cooks collard greens...
...DAVID SKINNER...
...Because of the money...
...The money, dude...
...My friend Nick's favorite is Diana Krall's whispery "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas" (available only on import, sadly), which is like a late-night cognac by the fire, the room filling with thoughts, regrets, and memories of people who are no longer part of your life...
...I heard it for the first time last year, driving on the Long Island Expressway with my wife, the two of us having just lost so many hours to traffic that we were dangerously low on yuletide cheer...
...But I confess to a sinking nervousness at the promise of so much joy, a slight fear that the festivities will turn out, like so many past Christmas moments, badly...
...Merry Christmas," the singer cried in an injured sort of bellow, "I don't want to fight tonight...
...In the cozy, prosperous town of Douglaston, Queens, where I grew up, at the local bar one December night, I exchange greetings with an ex-con I used to play handball with, a drug dealer I knew at Catholic school, and a kid I've known for years who's now a cop...
...They can't stay friends...
...He sits down, takes a breath, and again tries to sell me on writing this great screenplay for him...
...How about this tableau...
...Memories like these may not be the stuff of a Hallmark Holiday Special, but there happens to be a Christmas song that captures their magic...
...A pretty frightening moment, because in my mind's eye, this guy has not grown at all since sixth grade, while my actual eyes tell me he's at least a foot taller...
...Very few people are robbed or killed in Douglaston (despite the criminal element at the local dive...
Vol. 9 • December 2003 • No. 15
