Staff writer
After a week of vehicle related problems, I am thinking I need a sleigh for Christmas. Whoever decided that Santa would deliver Christmas presents every Christmas Eve using a sleigh pulled by reindeer, however long-ago that decision was made, was very, very smart.
A sleigh doesn’t need good roads, a sleigh doesn’t need rubber tires, a sleigh doesn’t depend on foreign or domestic oil prices, a sleigh can hold an unfathomable amount of presents, groceries, or children, and a sleigh doesn’t get hit by deer — it gets pulled by them!
No doubt about it, I need a sleigh.
I know it is easy to blame Marion County road conditions on the people employed to maintain them, but I do not plan to join that fray. I love where I live in Marion County, and frankly, I do not mind one bit that the roads are bit rough.
Washboards, eroded ditches, chunky ridges, mud, dirt, potholes at the corners — those things just add to the wild effect I love so much about my rural home. I even think it is kind of cool to drive to work in a vehicle covered in mud plops every now and then. Well, it is cool, until I have to empty the change hatch at the car wash. I wonder if Santa’s sleigh is self-cleaning? But, then again, since he does not travel on roads, he probably never gets dirty, never gets salt brine on his spokes, and never gets puddle-splashed.
Santa Claus also never has to change tires. The amount of flat tires we have had at our home this year is beyond comprehension. One recent morning we stepped out to get the fleet rolling to school and work, and had a flat tire on all four vehicles in commission. My van even had two flat tires. Of course, that is part of an on-going family argument. I do not like driving the mini-van. The tires are cheaply made, the clearance is too low for our road ridges, and there is no rule that says the mom has to get stuck with the mini-van.
Getting a sleigh like Santa’s would be a great solution to the “no-one wants to drive the mini-van” problem at our house.
Another thing I like about Santa’s sleigh is that he does not have to buy gas. Even with current gas prices falling at the pump, fuel expense is one of our largest budget woes. I guess it is another price to pay for living in a beautiful rural area, as we do. But, with a sleigh, there would be no fuel-cost punishment for having to drive 20 miles round trip to get the kids back and forth to school and related activities (sometimes we make that trip two or three times daily). The fact that we have to go 10 miles to get groceries and 30 miles or more to get to work would not be so dismal. Mile costs mean nothing to a sleigh-driver.
Then, of course, there is the sleigh advantage of holding everyone and everything at the same time. I have seen pictures of Santa’s fully loaded sleigh taking off from the North Pole. It is mindboggling to figure how nothing ever flies off or gets lost. It must be the magic of the sleigh … and I definitely need some of that this Christmas.
With all four children home at this time of year, it would be nice if we could all fit into the same vehicle to go to church, to go Christmas shopping, to get a Christmas tree. However, those long legs just do not crunch up like they used to in the back seat. Even the mini-van cannot hold us all anymore, especially if we want to put in groceries, presents, or a Christmas tree.
Santa, please bring me a sleigh!
Just the other day, I almost hit a deer. Well, to be more accurate, the deer almost hit me. I think it is safe to say that every driver in our family has hit a deer in the past 10 years. I am also thinking that just about every vehicle on our yard has been involved in some sort of deer situation. Isn’t it about time those crazy deer started working for us instead of just costing us money?
I think it would be so cool to go out in the morning and throw a loop over a couple of whitetails with big racks, hitch them to the front of the mini-van (which I will probably be stuck driving for eons to come), and shout out, “On Dasher, on Dancer, on Prancer and Vixen.”
No doubt about it, I need a sleigh.