Christmas, Elton, and the Reindeer

Mom was a Christmas freak.

Hundreds of lights. Two trees. Stockings everywhere. Christmas music nonstop. And enough relatives to violate several fire codes.

Even Bobo, our ¾ Collie, ¼ German Shepherd, wandered around with mistletoe hanging from his collar.

Mom also solved the annual in-law Christmas war brilliantly.

She held Christmas twice—Christmas Eve and Christmas Day.

Same food. Same drinks. Same presents. Same relatives telling the same stories.

If that didn’t work for your in-laws, it might be time to fold them back into the community.

Christmas dinner was the one formal event in our otherwise completely informal family. Sport coats, dresses, cocktails by the fireplace, piano-playing nieces and nephews, followed by Mom’s traditional beef stroganoff.

This went peacefully for nearly 40 years.

Then came Elton John Rocket Man.

Elton was my Bouvier des Flandres—a huge, shaggy Belgian sheepdog who looked like a cuddly bear.

The grandkids begged me to bring him to Christmas.

My wife at the time had a prediction:

“Absolutely not. He’ll screw something up, and it’ll be my fault.”

I promised Elton would stay downstairs with the kids.

She reluctantly agreed.

For a while, everything went beautifully.

Even Mrs. C, our 98-year-old great-aunt twice removed, was comfortably settled beside the fireplace. Next to her were the stockings, the Nativity scene and a decorated Styrofoam reindeer.

Then Elton escaped.

He crept down the hallway, peeked into the living room and spotted the reindeer.

Game on.

Elton charged behind the sofa, slid behind Mrs. C and mounted that Styrofoam reindeer like he’d been waiting for Christmas all year.

Mrs. C calmly tapped her cane.

“I think we have a problem over here.”

It took two of us to pry Elton off his new girlfriend.

My wife was ready to launch herself through the thermal-pane windows.

“We’re going home. NOW.”

“Just let us get through dinner.”

I locked Elton downstairs and hid the violated reindeer in the coat closet.

Crisis over.

Or so I thought.

Dinner ended. Everyone bundled up to leave. Elton was standing innocently in the foyer.

Then someone opened the coat closet.

Elton spotted the reindeer.

Round two.

He charged like a linebacker, bowling over poor 98-year-old Mrs. C and heading straight for his Christmas sweetheart.

The reindeer didn’t stand a chance.

Neither did Mrs. C.

Once again, it took a team effort to separate dog from décor.

My family howled.

My wife didn’t.

On the way home, I got the speech.

You know the one.

Eventually—like all challenging in-laws—

she was folded back into the community.