SOUNDTRACK: PEARL JAM-“Santa Cruz” (1993).
On December 2, Pearl Jam announced that their fan club holiday singles will be released to streaming services. Their first holiday single was released back in 1991. It was “Let Me Sleep (Christmas Time).” They are rolling out the songs one at a time under the banner 12 Days of Pearl Jam.
These releases are coming out as a daily surprise.
Pearl Jam released a song called “Santa God” the other day. This song also has Santa in the title, but it is not about Santa Claus. It is indeed about Santa Cruz.
This song appeared on the b side of the band’s terrific take on the John Doe song “Golden State” (co-sung with Corin Tucker of Sleater-Kinney).
This song also has a folkie feel–acoustic guitars and multi-tracked vocals from Eddie. It even opens with a harmonica!
It’s a delightful road song abut travelling to Santa Cruz:
Heading South a compass reads
Look at our speed, we’re going sixty-three
Look out the window as the trees go green
I look at them and they look at me
Got Neil Young on the stereo
He comes along whenever i go
It’s a really pretty song and deserves to get more airplay. Frankly if Santa Cruz hasn’t used it their official anthem, the town leaders are fools.
[READ: December 9, 2019] “The Snow Man”
This year, S. ordered me The Short Story Advent Calendar. This is my fourth time reading the Calendar. I didn’t know about the first one until it was long out of print (sigh), but each year since has been very enjoyable. Here’s what they say this year
The Short Story Advent Calendar is back! And to celebrate its fifth anniversary, we’ve decided to make the festivities even more festive, with five different coloured editions to help you ring in the holiday season.
No matter which colour you choose, the insides are the same: it’s another collection of expertly curated, individually bound short stories from some of the best writers in North America and beyond.
(This is a collection of literary, non-religious short stories for adults. For more information, visit our Frequently Asked Questions page.)
As always, each story is a surprise, so you won’t know what you’re getting until you crack the seal every morning starting December 1. Once you’ve read that day’s story, check back here to read an exclusive interview with the author.
Want a copy? Order one here.
I’m pairing music this year with some Christmas songs that I have come across this year.
This story, written over a hundred years ago, felt rather timeless. Aside from a few word choices and spelling, this story could have been written this year.
It’s also amusing that it is a Christmas story but is actually about a thief doing a job on Christmas Eve.
He starts the remembrance saying that he has both good and bad reasons for remembering Christmas of 189-. He’d had his eye on Wharton manor “as a crib worth the cracking” (being ahead of MTV Cribs by over 100 years). This particular job ended his thieving career and set him on the path to good.
The narrator assures us he was never the mere midnight marauder who is supposed to “lurk under the bed until the family is asleep.” He fancied himself better than that. He never carried a weapon and trusted fortune to be his guide:
if i were dolt enough to walk into a trap or let another man’s wits outwit mine…I ought to yield him the palm like a gentleman.
The manor was well protected–a large wall and a winding drive kept it hidden from sight. The wall was there more as a protection from the precipitous drop on the other side of it than to keep people out.
The ground was very snowy as he approached the manor. As he got close he thought he saw a man standing out back. But it was a snowman wearing a silk hat. He felt the impulse to to try to knock the snowman’s hat off wit a snowball but he knew better than to draw attention to himself.
A party was going on, with many wealthy attendees. Normally in such circumstances, a thief would creep around back, which was much safer, but the loot he wanted was in the front. So he climbed the ivy delicately pushed open the window.
But when he looked around he saw that another man, someone dressed as a gentleman’s valet was pocketing the smallest and most valuable items.
As soon as the other man saw him, he yelled “thieves! thieves!” A truer plural than anyone imagined.
The narrator thought about tackling the valet, but what was the use–no one would believe him. So he fled. He crashed into a servant, knocking down a tray of champagne glasses and causing a huge racket.
As he ran outside, all of the men at the party gave chase. They “would be many a young athlete from the ‘Varsities–men who could do their hundred in even time–socker and rugger men who were accustomed to rough and tumble.”
He knew he couldn’t outrun the men. No could he hide behind the trees.
Then he had an idea. I love the concept behind this and wonder if it could actually work:
I purposely fell headlong into the snow piled on the side of the drive, rolled over and over, and clutched an armful of it to my body and shoulders. I then scrambled up, leapt upon the stone balustrade, snatched the old silk hat from the head of the snow man, gave that unfortunate effigy a shove … and dropped upon my knees on the top of the snow foundation it had left behind.
Coincidentally a policeman happened up the drive. Not because of what had happened. Rather, he warned the party goers that a thief named “Toff” Smith was lurking about and they should keep an eye out for him. They all agreed that the man they were chasing was this “Toff” Smith.
Our narrator was not “Toff” Smith, although he had heard of him:
So I was now not only personating a snow man but involuntarily standing in the shoes of “Toff” Smith as well.
The men scoured the grounds, but weren’t too concerned because they knew the thief didn’t have time to take anything.
That’s when they notice the snowman and decide to give into the same impulse that the narrator resisted–see if they can knock of the top hat with snowballs.
The end of the snowball fight and the end of the story are wonderfully told and very satisfying. I love the idea of this being a regular Christmas story along with other classics.
I had never heard of A.B. Cooper, before this and actually can’t find much of anything about him. Which is quite a shame as this story is terrific.
The calendar says, It’s December 9. A. B. Cooper, author of Lost in the Arctic, was writing at the turn of the 20th century and so was unreachable for comment
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