For the holidays, the railing against my fellow man continues…

If you’re the sort who implements an advent calendar in your peaceful Christmas Holiday celebration methodology, you’ll know that its very last little teeny-tiny door gets opened on December 24^th, Christmas Eve, and it generally features an image of the Nativity Scene. Alternately, if you’re the sort of Michiana Shores area resident (of the second-home-owning ilk, naturally) who implements the explosions of M-80s, the practice of outdoor human shouting/shrieking/bellowing, the cranking of the volume of an ever-expanding radius of rockin’ beats blasting from your bitchin’ speakers, and the arrival at your front door (your actual house’s, not your advent calendar’s) of a not insignificant police presence in your own nocturnal Christmas Eve observances, then there are also probably better than even odds that it’s your own mug shot that lurks behind the Michiana Shores Vicinity Special Edition Advent Calendar’s teeny-tiny December 24th door.

Last night, December 23^rd, the explosions of what sounded like multiple M-80s (incredibly loud and powerful firecrackers) began from a location not far beyond the boundaries of my own property. Sometime around 7:30 PM. In evident anticipatory celebration of the Western World’s biggest religious holiday and its Peace-on-Earth-Silent-Night evening prior. That’s right. Last night was the gunpowder-fueled Michiana Shores vicinity’s Eve of Christmas Eve. The explosions continued, on and off, for another couple of hours, and they served as both an ear-splitting reminder of what happened last year on Christmas Eve, and a harbinger of Christmas Eve Yet to Come, right here in my neck of the woods.

To summarize: Last year, on Christmas Eve, at approximately 10:45 PM, the occupants of a home (a second, “summer home”) in the vicinity of my own neighborhood began igniting M-80 firecrackers, shouting and screaming, and blasting music loud enough for me to hear inside my own house with my television on. And loud enough for a number of other area residents to hear inside their own homes, as well. I was evidently not the first person to alert the police to the issue. The bottom line is that the ruckus continued for an additional 20 minutes or so until a sizeable contingent of police officers showed up and shut the festivities down. The apocrypha floating around in the ‘hood on Christmas Day alleged that arrests were made. One could only hope.

The reverberating evening-song of last night’s M-80 demonstration, emanating from the very house and environs that served as the scene of last year’s nightmare before Christmas, has admittedly got me on edge.

So, as I’m writing this, I’m bracing for impact – both the literal one caused by the nearby detonating M-80s’ jarring sonic displacement of nighttime winter air, and the figurative, as born of the consideration of one of three possibilities relating to the ideological inclinations of the offending parties: 1) Are these offensive merrymakers simply non-observers of the Christmas Holiday and therefore ignorant of the desire of those who do celebrate it to do so peacefully, reverently, and quietly? 2) Are they indeed Christmas observers who have somehow equated the dubious “Oriental” genealogy of those Nativity story staples, the celebrated Magi – the Three Kings of story and song – with the invention of gunpowder, indicating a clear connection to their generous Christmas Eve use of M-80s? (If this second possibility is the case, it represents an unfortunate misapprehension arising from an obvious anachronism – gunpowder, though Chinese, and therefore Oriental in origin, wasn’t invented until 900 years after the death of Christ. It might also suggest a potential and alarming racist pigeon-holing, or worse, what some might even consider racial profiling, of the venerable Magi.) 3) Are these offending disturbers of the peace inconsiderate, self-absorbed, brain-dead douche bags?

Not one of the above three possibilities bodes well for the reasonable expectation of a silent night ahead.

If I’m lucky, the partiers in question will remember what happened last year, when an assemblage of pissed off neighbors rallied against the onslaught of noise and nonsense and called the cops on them. Maybe these memories will stymie any potential efforts this year to wreck their neighbors’ hopes for a silent night and peace on Earth. Or maybe they’ll disregard the lessons of the past and decide to tear the evening a new asshole. Just like they did last Christmas Eve. And in that case, maybe Santa Claus will stick them on his Naughty List. Maybe they’ll get coal from Santa. Maybe something like 200 tons of it. Dropped, from his sleigh, from somewhere way the hell up in the Ionosphere, right on top of their house. Let’s see ‘em try to open that last little teeny-tiny door then.

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to those who celebrate, and Peace on Earth unto all.

Cheers, and Happy Gardening!

Note to readers: In the spirit of assigning credit wherever and whenever it’s due, I’ll mention that the inspiration for this short piece comes from a suggestion by my wife Ann, who’s sown more than a few seeds in the otherwise inhospitable dirt of my limited imagination. (Thanks again, honey!)