It is the Christmas Season, so I suppose there is no particular reason to avoid any sentimental moment that is out there to be indulged in, although I’m pretty immune to the shopping stuff. Today I was over in Tsawwassen and after doing the laundry at the laundromat and spending $3.00 each at the Dollar Store and the Thrift Store, I was ready to call it a Christmas shopping day and get back across the border where there is consumer safety. But the sentimental moments are different from shopping. There is, for example, the local school’s Christmas Program, which was held tonight from 6-7 p.m.
Actually, it went on rather longer and may have started earlier, but we arrived for the main event and left just as Santa Claus arrived to bestow his goods. The kids in Point Roberts who are actually in public school in Point Roberts are few in number. And the number is exactly 12, and each of the 12 has a pretty exotic name. We are not doing Mary’s or John’s or even Emma’s up here. More like Trinity and Marisol and Tristian.
It is just grades K-2; after that, they have to take the bus over and across the border to Blaine, or betake themselves to some private school in Canada. The school building here on the Point is small, but relatively new because up until fairly recently, they all went down to Blaine on the bus. They have a single teacher for their tiny school house (and maybe a volunteer assistant), but she surely has one of the best jobs in the world, although one that leaves her plenty tired by the end of each school day, I imagine.
The Christmas program tonight appeared to feature everybody in the school. Everyone got a speaking part, everyone got a singing part, and, finest of all, everyone got a dancing part. The evening began with a play about snow coming to Point Roberts and a few kids deciding to build a snowman; other kids wanted to join in, but they were sent off to their own activities until the original snowman builders figured out that they really needed more hands for this job than they had. Then everybody joined in, the snowman got built, the value of solidarity was established. Touched by the solidarity, the snow fairy came, during the night, and tapped the snowman with her magic wand so he could be alive. And when the kids came to school the next morning, they all, children and snowman, danced for joy. The end. I’ve seen this play before; we’ve all seen it, but it’s a play I’m happy to see over and over.
After that, the kids sang some songs and recited some poems and then ended the evening with a rousing singing-dancing rendition of, as the program named it, “La Ku Ka Ra Cha” (which made it look like it might be going to be a what? Korean? version of this Mexican classic). I don’t believe I have ever seen a Christmas program that included La Cucaracha, but it makes an excellent finale. Maybe it should always be included for Christmas; maybe ‘The Nutcracker’ performances could stick it in as an additional dance?
I don’t know how many children's Christmas programs I’ve seen by this time in my life: my own, my sisters’ and brothers’, my children's, my friends’ children's, my grandchildren's. And now I’m going to kids’ Christmas programs where I know not a kid among the performers. But it’s always just as wonderful as the first time. The kids are so intent, so enthusiastic, so visibly nervous. But at the same time, they are obviously just killing themselves to do a good job. And a good job it always is.
They’re all at home by now, still flushed with excitement, trying hard not to let go of it as they also try to go to sleep. It’s like the old joke (although the joke is originally about elephants, it's truer of children): How can you get children out of the theater? You can’t. It’s in their blood.
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