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Dear Family and Friends:
Apologies to those of you who noted that the only mark left by this writer on last year’s holiday season was a change of address card. (Apologies also to those who did not even receive that card. My postcards, with an address on both the right- and left-hand side of the card, brought the Post-Office computers to their knees, provided that office with an excellent excuse for the general delay in holiday mail, and filled my mailbox with my own change of address cards, which, I suppose, was a blessing, since it helped me learn my new address.)
"What," you may be wondering, "ever happened to your Christmas cards?" To be brief, last year was a bummer. (This year was a bummer too; more on that later.) Last year was enough of a bummer that I really didn’t feel like sending Christmas cards, much less writing an Impersonal Christmas Form Letter. I suppose you won’t be happy without the details, so here are a few notable events (in chronological order).
Anemia whilst training for a marathon. It is interesting to have one’s legs say to one, in the middle of a run, "Why don’t you just go on without us."
A divorce. Don’t ask why. I’m not entirely sure I know why myself.
A precipitate move to San Antonio to take a job at the offices of the Mei Technology Corporation. (Please note the capitalization of "Mei." The firm is, in the best of traditions, named for its owner, Dr. Peng Siu Mei. "Mei" does not stand for Mona’s Eateries, Inc., Megagalactic Enterprises, International, or any thing else except "Mei.")
Here is how this move came about. I had, for the past four years or so been engaged, on and off, in an effort to stop the Air Force from pursuing the foolhardy enterprise of automating instructional design and development (in plain language, getting computers to make up lessons). The Air Force ignored my good counsel, but I stayed with the effort because of the generous fee and the occasional free trip to San Antonio for the finest Mexican food in the country.
In October of ‘94, on one of these trips to San Antonio, I was jumped by Mei employees, escorted to the corporate offices and suspended by the collar on a meathook. It was explained to me that one of firm’s scientists had left on the eve that he was to have taken over the very project that I had been advising the Air Fore against for so many years. I was offered a choice: take over the project myself or spend the rest of my life hanging from a meathook. It was a no brainer. After all, apart from the finest Mexican food in the country, San Antonio is the home of my ancestors. Some of the saner members of my family still live here. My branch left for Midland two generations ago. This was not, and still is not, a move that sensible people make, and so should tell you something about the mental capacities of my immediate forebears. Fortunately, those Halffs who stayed in San Antonio appear to be reasonable people.
So here I am in San Antonio. I have a wide-brimmed hat, am working on getting boots, and I listen to Tejano music. I eat barbecue and Mexican food. I drink Margaritas and Shiner Bock. I do not have a pickup or Suburban, but who knows what the future may bring.
Fast forward. if you don’t mind, to this year. I am beginning to think I can make this project (which, by the way, is all about a computer program called AIDA, which stands, not for a young woman trapped in a pyramid, but for Advanced Instructional Design Advisor, which is a misnomer since the program doesn’t really give advice at all.)
I also have this other project which involves a computer game to teach certain folk in the Army National Guard how to do logistics. This project arose because my previous project to build a computer game that teaches electricity was something of a success. (Well, at least it took the Navy six months of intensive data analysis to show that it wasn’t a success.)
So one day in March, I am riding my bike up a minor hill in my neighborhood, and the bike, on its own, begins to wobble, and then, still on its own, falls over, dumping me on the asphalt in such a way that my femur (thigh bone) pops into the acetabulum (socket in pelvis (hip bone)) and smashes it into itty-bitty bits. With a little help, I manage to get myself to the hospital, where I consult a doctor. "Hmm,… What we got to do here is get your thigh-bone, er, femur, out of that socket in your hip bone, er, pelvis, er, I mean, out of your acetabulum. Two months in traction should do the trick." So they put a rod through my knee hang 60 lb. on it, pump me full of drugs (to provide entertainment for visitors) and leave me propped up in bed for two months. I move a couple of computers into the hospital room in a vain attempt to rescue my projects. (Don’t every try to work while you’re pumped full of drugs and 60 lb. is hanging from a rod in your knee.) During this time, my parents move into my house, perhaps because it is easier to keep clean than their own. My father, through daily study of the San Antonio News-Express becomes the world’s leading expert on the Edwards aquifer, San Antonio’s only source of both water and local controversy.
They finally boot me out of the hospital after I pinch one nurse too many, and I wander around on crutches for two more months. During this time, a couple of notable events occur. First, my femur creeps back up into my acetabulum (I’m getting good at the terminology) thus causing great distress to my orthopedist. I’m still on drugs; what do I care.
Second, some unknown construction worker in my subdivision finds that he has, on his hands, the ugliest puppy in the world. Not realizing the value of such a beast to side shows and the like, he dumps the critter in my neighborhood. I (still on drugs, you may recall) decide that the varmint deserves a decent chance at survival and take her in, thinking to myself that I will give her away directly. No one, as it turns out, wants the ugliest puppy in the world, so I am stuck with her. (A neighbor said that he needed a wife, not a dog. It did not occur to him that the two could co-exist. A colleague said that she was quite content with her hermit crabs, which, I must confess, at least have the decency to keep their ugliness in a shell.) I have named her (the dog, not the colleague) "Cady," hoping at least to spare myself the trouble of learning a new dog name.
But I mend. I am no longer on drugs, and am left only with a limp, occasional soreness, and an inability to position my leg in such a way that I can tie my shoe. My doctor is once again optimistic. Where he once simply said, "Don’t ever run again," he now adds, "but if you’re going to ignore this order, wait until Spring."
For Christmas, I still seek the impossible: a little love, a day at work without too much to do, and a nice long run. These things being, at least for the moment, out of reach, I’m off to San Diego for the holidays to study the pelicans. As usual, I urge you to join me in lighting candles, giving gifts, singing, dancing, and praying, so that we can keep the spirit of the season going as long as we can.
It was Christmas time for the rich and poor,
And every ranch was an open door.…
The cowboy that came on a company horse
Was treated the same as the owner or boss.
Nobody seemed to have a care.
You were in amongst friends or you weren’t there.Old Time Christmas
Bruce Kiskaddon
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