Bag of Switches
written by: Ed Sams
When the Santa Cruz Sentinel ran an article about Neopaganism four days before Christmas, Steve and Rachel Ruckman wholeheartedly approved. “It’s time we receive some notice,” they told their tenant, Linda, who lived in the other half of their Ben Lomond duplex.
Linda agreed. “My coven is meeting tonight for the solstice. I just gotta show them the article.”
“You’re meeting outdoors tonight?” Steve asked.
“It’s not like we’re dancing naked around a campfire,” Linda explained.
Steve nodded in complete agreement, then said, “But the weather’s so cold this year. There was snow the other morning.”
“We’ll make out all right,” Linda told him. “You’re coming, aren’t you, Rachel.”
Rachel shook her dark bangs. “No, Steve and I are still getting ready for Christmas Eve.”
“I thought you were Jehovah Witness,” Linda said, scratching her blonde crewcut.
“No, Steve’s a cultural Christian; he likes the Christmas trees and Easter eggs,” Rachel said. “I’m an atheist. We became neopagans as a compromise for the children’s sake. Aran and Tara want to believe in something, so why not Santa Claus? We put on a good show for the 24th.”
“We don’t do anything on the 25th, “Steve added.
Rachel smiled. “The kids get so much the night before, they stay busy the whole day playing with their presents.”
Linda sighed. “Santa Claus is a good myth… as myths go.”
Steve agreed. “It’s so easy not to do for children, if you don’t celebrate some holidays.”
“Yes, that’s the point of holidays,” Rachel said. “Special times of the year are good for no other reason than to shake us up and get us out of our ruts.”
“Exactly,” said Linda, “that’s what Neopaganism is all about, forming your own rituals, empowering your own sense of self-reverence.” She looked out the front window of their shared duplex and shivered. “It can be a lot of trouble, creating your own new traditions each year.”
Steve thought about Linda’s comment on the 22nd when he and Rachel took Aran and Tara to see Santa Claus at the Capitola Mall. Aran, age eight, was dark like his mother, but Tara, age six, resembled her father with straw-colored hair.
“Tell me again,” Tara said, “why does Santa Claus bring presents?”
“Because he wants to,” Rachel told her.
“Why only on the 24th?” asked Aran.
Rachel appealed to Steve, who had listened to the conversation while driving the family Prius.
“This is the end of the year,” Steve said. “A lot of people take stock of the past year to decide if their lives are good or bad.”
“Yeah,” Aran said, cutting in. “Santa doesn’t always bring good presents, y’a know. Ella says sometimes he brings switches.”
“Light switches?” Tara asked.
“No, Stupid, like sticks to spank your bottom.”
“Who’s Ella?” Steve asked.
“One of the old ladies up the road,” Rachel said. She turned to face the back seat. “I’ve never, ever known Santa to bring anyone switches. Don’t be frightened by what Ella says. Our lives are good, and you’re going to get lots of lovely things when Santa comes.”
“Which means,” Steve thought, “there are lots of lovely things still to buy.” He left Rachel and the kids in the long line at Santa’s icicle throne while he rushed through the mall with the shopping list. Rachel had gotten most of the toys, but there were still presents to be bought to make their home cheerful and comfortable. Rachel especially wanted a new designer bedspread for the newly remodeled bedroom. The duvet in a simple Shaker design costs $600.00. When handing the saleswoman his gold card, Steve remembered what Linda had said. Dreaming up things to celebrate can be more trouble than ignoring the season altogether.
On the 23rd, there was a cold snap, and the pipes froze. Rachel complained bitterly all morning because there was no water to wash last night’s dishes. It was all very unfair.
Steve walked into town to buy bottled water. On the way, he ran into Billy, a thirty-year-old stylist with flame-colored hair, who rented a garage apartment from one of the neighbors. Billy was also a Neopagan. He belonged to a gay coalition called Radical Faeries.
“Forget about water, man,” Billy told him. “Water’s hard on the skin this time of year. What you want is a sweat lodge. That’s what the Radical Faeries do. A bunch of us brothers go off and sweat in this sauna we built. Then when we can’t take the heat anymore, we rush outside stark naked and plunge in an ice-cold pool. You oughta come join us, Steve.”
“No thanks, the wife, the kids, you know, the holidays.” Steve was having a hard time not bringing up Christmas.
Billy smiled. “What’s the good of a holiday if you only waste your time making other people happy?”
When Steve came back, lugging two clear plastic jugs of water, Rachel helped him at the door. “I called the Water District,” she told Steve. “They said to pour hot water on the pipes, and that should melt the ice.”
“I always thought that would make the pipes break.”
“Well, the district says otherwise,” Rachel argued, “and we need to do laundry.”
Steve went outside and poured hot water on his exposed pipes. The day was nearly over. Even though it was only four o’clock, it would soon be dark. Within minutes after Steve went inside to get warm, Aran came shouting, “There’s a gusher in the backyard.”
Steve ran outside once more, only to find his pipes spraying icy water everywhere. Linda stuck her head out a window cursing—first at Steve, then at the weather, then at her luck. Steve felt the same way.
“What’s happening!” Rachel cried, and Steve told her to call the Water District. In the meantime, he rushed around madly in the growing darkness trying to find his water main, and then trying to shut it off. Finally, a half an hour later, when he was miserably wet and cold, a Water District pick-up pulled into the driveway. A young man with a trim black moustache got out.
“The hot water didn’t cause the leak,” he assured Steve. “The expanding water, when it froze in the pipes, did that.” He pulled out a T-bar and turned off Steve’s water main. “That takes care of the leak for now.”
“But we won’t have water until the leak gets fixed,” Steve said, “and tomorrow is Christmas Eve!”
“Yeah,” the young man sympathized. “It’s going to be hard getting anyone in the next two days, seeing how it’s the holidays and all. Tell you what. Here’s an inch and half of pipefitting, and here’s some sealer. Take it. It’s a present.”
“Thank you,” Steve muttered, not knowing what to do with these gifts.
“No, problem!” the young man smiled. “It’s Christmas!”
Steve spent the morning of Christmas Eve slamming a shovel into the hard ground, hoping to find a break in the water line. As he shoveled and pounded the frozen dirt, his back ached and stung as if he were being whipped. He felt whipped. Every so often, he would look up and find three hopeful faces watching him through the kitchen windows. Just before noon, a van pulled up. A long-haired man in overalls jumped out of the cab. “What’s wrong, Bro?” It was Luke, one of the workers who had built the new addition, come for his last paycheck. “Let me take a look.” Steve gratefully handed him the shovel.
“The ground is rock hard,” Steve warned.
Luke prodded the hole. “Looks like something’s buried here.”
“What is it, Daddy?”
Steve looked up and saw Aran and Tara approaching in ski jackets. When he looked back at the hole, he saw the back of a tiny human neck.
“My God! Is it alive or dead?” Steve asked.
Luke turned his calm blue eyes up at Steve’s worried face. “Neither,” he smiled. “It’s a statue.”
“A statue?” Steve frowned. “Who would bury a statue?”
Luke pulled out a short stone figure and stood it upright next to the garden spigot.
“Hey, cool!” shouted Aran. “Look, it’s a little man.”
“Is that Santa?” Tara asked.
Luke swept back a stray lock of graying hair. “No, it’s Saint Joseph. People used to bury statues of him to bring good luck to their homes.”
Aran wrinkled up his nose. “Saint Joseph, who’s he?”
“He was the father of Baby Jesus,” Luke explained. “It’s funny that he should become the patron saint of homes, seeing how he was always away from his own. First, going to Bethlehem with Mary and being in a barn when Jesus was born …”
“A barn!” squealed Tara.
Luke nodded. “Then the Wise Men followed the star and told King Herod about the baby, so Joseph had to pack up his family and head out to Egypt to escape the slaughter of the innocents.”
“The what?” both children cried.
Steve interrupted. “Could we get back to the problem at hand.”
“Here’s your problem,” Luke said, pointing to a scar of black ice running down the side of the pipe. “The leak was never deep in the ground,” Luke explained. “It’s just at the bottom where the pipe was exposed. You make too much work for yourself, Bro.” He smiled.
Steve tried to smile back, but grimaced instead. “What can I help you do?” He asked, hoping Luke had agreed to finish the job.
“A cup of coffee would be nice.”
Steve rushed back inside and had Rachel make a pot of coffee from the last of the bottled water. By the time the coffee was made, the leak was mended.
When Luke handed Steve the empty coffee cup, Steve handed Luke his last paycheck along with a tidy bonus. “Here, let me help you with your tools,” Steve said, ready for Luke to leave. He picked up the heavy metal box, swinging it toward the open rear door of the van. Inside the van were tools, clothing, bedding, a hibachi, and a cooler. “You live in here?” he heard himself ask.
“I call it home,” Luke replied. “Now there’s only one more thing to do.” He picked up Steve’s discarded T-bar and turned on the water main.
Steve breathed a sigh of relief as he heard water rush underneath him, while seeing no sign of it rushing up around him. “How can I ever thank you!” Steve gushed.
Luke’s kind face looked up slyly at Steve’s, then looked embarrassed. “Well, it would be nice to have some place to park my van for the next few days, so I don’t have to worry about moving it.”
“Well, okay,” Steve said, “you can park your car here… for the next two days.”
Luke heaved a heavy sigh, his breath making a smokestack in the icy air. “Thanks, Bro, Merry Christmas.”
“It must be hard with no place to call home.”
Luke patted the statue of Saint Joseph. “Some of us gotta make ourselves at home wherever we go.”
Steve looked into the calm blue eyes. “Excuse me.”
Back inside the house, he heard the dishwasher and washing machine going as well as bath water being run in the master suite. Rachel was waiting for him in the bedroom. “I’ve fixed you a nice warm bath. Get cleaned up, and then I want you to go downtown for a few more things tonight.”
Steve felt like a new man when he marched down the hill toward the market. He waved to Billy, who was checking his mail. “How are you making out these days?” he asked.
Billy shook his head. “For the past two days, I’ve been going over to my landlord and showering there. Last night he didn’t have any water either, so we both said Fuck-it and checked into a motel.”
“What about your sweat lodge and your solstice rituals?” Steve asked.
“I’m making up new rituals, ones that go with X-rated cable and vibrator beds.”
On the way to the Ben Lomond Super, Steve noticed a line of people at the Fire Hall, all with jugs in their hands. “What’s going on?” he asked an old lady in front of him.
“Phase Five Alert,” she said. “We’re in a water emergency. The main water lines have frozen. The water district plans to shut down the wells for the next forty-eight hours while they make repairs. You better get what water you’ll need.” She paused and peered at him through her thick-framed glasses. “Say, aren’t Aran and Tara’s dad? I’m your neighbor up the street.”
Here was Ella, the old biddy who filled his children’s stories about switches. Nevertheless, she gave him a ride home, luckily, for Steve spent his money only on water and even then more water than he could carry up the hill.
Ella had an iron-gray perm and an iron constitution. In her ancient Volvo, she favored Steve with all her opinions stored up carefully throughout the year. “No Christmas tree again in Scotts Valley schools! I wrote a letter last year to the Valley Press, complaining about the bigoted liberals who shout separation of church and state. The tree is a pagan symbol adopted by Christians to bring heathens and Christians together. It’s a sad day,” she told Steve, “when the Christians are more broad-minded than the liberals.”
Steve tried to murmur something polite, but gave up. Instead, he turned the conversation to the water emergency.
Ella had been in the mountains for nearly fifty years. No emergency seemed new to her. “They ought to shut down the wells till they fix the pipes,” she told him, her grey perm nodding in agreement. “We all better boil any tap water too until we’re sure the water’s not contaminated.”
Contaminated! Steve thanked Ella for the ride, and then left the water jugs at the curb as he went to look for Rachel. Rachel was in the master suite. Her face was red and her eyes swollen.
“Look! Just look at this!” She grabbed the new designer bedspread with both hands, where a black, muddy smear marked the simple Shaker pattern. “Neither Aran or Tara will admit to making it, so both are having time-outs in separate rooms. We try so hard to give them a happy holiday, and this is what they do!”
“Can’t we wash it?” Steve asked.
“With what? After your bath, the water went off again.”
Steve sighed, then told Rachel about their latest emergency.
“Why is this happening now… to us?” Rachel moaned. “We try so hard, and nothing we do helps anything.”
Steve wrapped his arms around her shoulders. “Things could be worse,” he said softly. “We have a home, and each other, and the kids. We could be like that poor guy I let park in our driveway.”
Him!” Rachel cried, as if remembering yet another indignity. “I sent him packing. I caught him telling the children about the Slaughter of the Innocents. Imagine! The man’s a religious nut.”
“You sent him away at this time of year?”
“This time of year is no different than any other time,” Rachel argued.
“It’s colder!” Steve said. He stormed out of the room, wondering why he was so upset. He wasn’t especially angry with Rachel for turning away Luke; he had not really wanted him on the property, even for two days. Perhaps he was even relieved that Luke had left. Still, he wanted to hear from his own children what had happened.
Steve found Aran coloring in his Pagan Child’s Coloring Book. “Are there really the Summerlands, Dad, where we all go when we die?”
Steve looked at the coloring book with the large vacant drawing waiting for details to be drawn in. “Your mother got this for you at the bookstore. She wanted you to be comfortable with the thought of dying.”
Aran nodded. “So none of this is for reals.”
Steve shrugged his shoulders, exhausted, then admitted no.
Aran nodded again. “Okay, then what’s all this for?”
Steven merely patted his son on the arm and left to find Tara. She was gazing out the window into the clear dark night. “Which star?” she asked. “The man said there was a star.”
“Tara, did the man frighten you?”
“No.”
“Mommy’s very angry because her bedspread is dirty.”
Tara sighed. “I know. Santa will bring us switches.”
“Santa doesn’t bring switches,” Steve began. Then he thought about the lack of water. Then he remembered all the treats he forgot to buy at the store. Then he pictured Rachel crying over her ruined bedspread.
“Ella says that switches are gifts too. Santa doesn’t just bring what we want, but also what we need.”
“We got no water!” Steve blurted out.
Tara looked up at him. “We got stars.” She looked out the window. “Which one is it?”
Steve looked out the window and up at the stars. There were so many! Which one indeed?
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