This seems to be a tradition for me now: a blog greeting and a reference to Charles Dicken’s A Christmas Carol (heartwarming, relatively short, and copyright free!). Christmas may be about the baby Jesus. Or family. Or downright commercialism. But for the longest time now, the season for me has been about the Others. Those who shiver in the dark. We need to remember this. Now more than ever.
“Spirit!� he cried, tight clutching at its robe, “hear me! I am not the man I was. I will not be the man I must have been but for this intercourse. Why show me this, if I am past all hope!�
For the first time the hand appeared to shake.
“Good Spirit,� he pursued, as down upon the ground he fell before it: “Your nature intercedes for me, and pities me. Assure me that I yet may change these shadows you have shown me, by an altered life!�
The kind hand trembled.
“I will honour Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year. I will live in the Past, the Present, and the Future. The Spirits of all Three shall strive within me. I will not shut out the lessons that they teach. Oh, tell me I may sponge away the writing on this stone!�
In his agony, he caught the spectral hand. It sought to free itself, but he was strong in his entreaty, and detained it. The Spirit, stronger yet, repulsed him.
Holding up his hands in a last prayer to have his fate reversed, he saw an alteration in the Phantom’s hood and dress. It shrunk, collapsed, and dwindled down into a bedpost.
Merry Christmas, everyone!!!
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