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Christmas with Louise...
This is
an article submitted to a 1999 Louisville Sentinel contest
to find out who had the wildest Christmas
dinner. This won first prize.
What they say about Santa checking the list twice must be true because every Christmas morning, although Jays kids stockings were overflowed, his poor pantyhose hung sadly empty.
One year I decided to make his dream come
true. I put on sunglasses and went in search of an inflatable love doll.
They don't sell those things at Wal-Mart.
I had to go to an adult bookstore downtown.
If youve never been in an X-rated store, dont go. You'll only confuse
yourself. I was there an hour saying things like,
What does this do?
Youre kidding me!
Who would buy that? Finally, I made it to the
inflatable doll section. I wanted to buy a standard, uncomplicated doll
that could also substitute as a passenger in my truck so I could use the
car pool lane during rush hour.
Finding what I wanted was difficult. Love
dolls come in many different models. The top of the line, according to the
side of the box, could do things Id only seen in a book on animal
husbandry. I settled for
Lovable Louise. She was at the bottom of the
price scale. To call Louise a
doll took a huge leap of imagination.
On Christmas Eve, with the help of an old
bicycle pump,
Louise came to life.
My
sister-in-law was in on the plan and let me in during the wee morning
hours, long after Santa had come and gone, I filled the dangling pantyhose
with Louise's pliant legs and bottom. I also ate some cookies and drank
what remained of a glass of milk on a nearby tray. I went home, and
giggled for a couple of hours.
The next morning my brother called to say
that Santa had been to his house and left a present that had made him VERY
happy but had left the dog confused. She would bark, start to walk away,
then come back and bark some more. We all agreed that Louise should remain
in her panty hose so the rest of the family could admire her when they
came over for the traditional Christmas dinner.
My grandmother noticed Louise the moment
she walked in the door.
What the hell is that? she asked. My brother
quickly explained,
Its
a doll.
Who would play with something like that? Granny snapped. I had several candidates in mind, but kept my mouth shut.
Where are her
clothes?
Granny continued. Boy,
that turkey sure smells nice, Gran, Jay said, trying to steer her into
the dining room. But Granny was relentless.
Why doesn't she have any
teeth? Again, I could have answered, but why would I? It was Christmas
and
no one wanted to ride in the back of the ambulance saying,
Hang on Granny!
Hang on!
My
grandfather, a delightful old man with
poor eyesight, sidled up to me and said,
Hey, who's the naked gal by the fireplace? I told him she was Jays
friend. A few minutes later I noticed Grandpa by the mantel, talking to
Louise. Not just talking, but actually flirting. It was then that we
realized this might be Grandpa's last Christmas at home.
The dinner went well. We made the usual
small talk about who had died, who was dying, and who should be killed,
when suddenly Louise made a noise that sounded a lot like my father in the
bathroom in the morning. Then she lurched from the panty hose, flew
around the room twice, and fell in a heap in front of the sofa. The cat
screamed. I passed cranberry sauce through my nose, and Grandpa ran
across the room, fell to his knees, and began administering mouth to mouth
resuscitation. My brother fell back over his chair and wet his pants and
Granny threw down her napkin, stomped out of the room, and sat in the
car. It was indeed a Christmas to treasure and remember. Later in my brother's garage, we conducted a thorough examination to decide the cause of Louises collapse. We discovered that Louise had suffered from a hot ember to the back of her right thigh. Fortunately, thanks to a wonder drug called duct tape, we restored her to perfect health. Louise went on to star in several bachelor party movies. I think Grandpa still calls her whenever he can get out of the house.
Contributed...
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