Plans Ahoy!

 

It is late in the evening and Jack Green is sitting in the kitchen by the Aga relating stories of his experiences of being Lord of Misrule to the increasingly cheerful-looking hens. All animosity between Mrs Miggins and Misses Pumphrey, Poo and Slocombe is forgotten, so caught up are they in this unexpected chance to have the sort of exciting Christmas celebrations to which they are accustomed. Even Bambino is considering rescheduling his Caribbean cruise.

Mrs Miggins is sitting at the kitchen table scribbling away in her massive planning notebook. This is where she excels – organising the chaotic into the slightly less chaotic. She especially enjoys it if it’s at short notice and the pressure is on. Put a hen in hot water, and what do you get? Action, that’s what. And possibly the smell of some fancy bubble bath.

‘So,’ she says, ‘basically, we are going to help you put on a three-day Yuletide Festival celebration which will reinforce the magic of the Old Ways of the Land and secure the safety and productivity of the World for another year?’

‘Implausible as that sounds, yes,’ says Jack. ‘It’s all about tradition and symbolism, you see. Giving people hope for the future during the cold, bleak Winter months. Showing them that after loss and rest comes growth and renewal.’

‘It sounds a bit, well, superstitious to me,’ says Mrs Poo. 'A bit woo-woo.'

‘There’s a lot to be said for superstition,’ says Mrs Pumphrey. ‘For example, I sprinkle elephant dust around the gardens EVERY morning, and we’ve NEVER suffered a plague of elephants, have we?’

In the face of the evidence, the others have to admit, that no, they haven’t.

‘And this magic works via the telling of a series of Yuletide stories, yes?’ says Mrs Miggins, still scribbling, her chicken eyes rows furrowed with concentration.

‘It does,’ says Jack. ‘Don’t ask me how it works, but it does, and it has done so for hundreds and hundreds of years. Although,’ he adds, somewhat ruefully, ‘it’s getting harder every year.’

‘As the actress said to the bishop!’ says Ptolemy.

‘Really, PP!’ says a shocked Mrs Pumphrey, and she goes all pink and coquettish.

‘What are these stories?’ says Mrs Slocombe, who has been on hot chocolate and ginger cake duties and thinking, this is more like it. This is more like Christmas.

Jack thinks for a moment. ‘Well, for example, 13^th December is St Lucia’s Day which celebrates Lussi, who was a horrible and powerful demon. She flies on a broomstick, causing chaos, destroying property, killing crops and livestock, and kidnapping people.’

‘Sounds cheerful,’ says Mrs Slocombe.

‘Sounds like my distant cousin Teresa,’ says Mrs Poo. ‘Distant for a reason.’

Jack continues. ‘Then there’s Krampus,’ he says. ‘He is a demon goat. He collects horrid children and takes them away forever.’

‘Sounds like an excellent public service to me,’ says Mrs Poo.

‘Or the 13 Yule Lords,’ says Jack. ‘They are sometimes known as the Yulemen. They visit houses to tell grim and gruesome stories, play jokes and deliver light acts of mischief to cheer up the dark Winter. They have a cat, which stalks the land looking for children to eat. I rather like the Yulemen. I thought perhaps we could base our performance around them. Especially as we have a cat.’ And he looks at Bambino who is sitting on the table washing ginger cake crumbs from his whiskers.

Mrs Miggins looks up from her notetaking.

‘If I may be as bold to say,’ she says, ‘none of these stories and characters sound very Christmassy, do they?’

‘That’s because they are Yuletide stories,’ says Jack. ‘And Yule has been around longer than Christmas. Back to the days when life was a lot grimmer. Before Human Rights were invented.’

‘And they’re not very child-centered stories, are they?’ persists Mrs Miggins, who has been led to believe that Christmas is all about the children, even though she finds children annoying, irritating and self-entitled little snotbags. 

‘Is that a problem?’ says Jack. ‘

Mrs Miggins shrugs. 'I suppose not,' she says.