Hart of the Matter
It’s that time again when little Haverhill must set about writing its letter to Santa in the hope of receiving some presents on Christmas morning which are larger and more expensive than anything the Parents can afford.
So what should we put top of our list? It’s never easy deciding when there are so many things which would make life easier and more enjoyable.
Top of the list, if I had any say in prioritising, would be a pair of binoculars and a neck support which we could put at the disposal of our short-sighted Parents. Armed with these they might be able to redirect their gaze to a wider panorama and a more distant horizon than they appear to be able to view from the middle of Ipswich or Bury St Edmunds.
Then, of course, there is that perennial favourite, the train set. Every year we drop various hints about it, but so far there seems to be little encouragement that we will ever get one until we are old enough to go out to work and save up for one ourselves.
Instead, they keep giving us packs of easy-to-build little houses, and with each of them comes a couple of free cars. We’ve got so many cars in the toy cupboard now that we don’t know what to do with them. There isn’t enough room in our layout to put them all out, so we have queues of them lined up to the doors of our playroom.
It makes life very difficult, because right down the middle of the main street in our layout, which we have to use to get around the room, there are now hundreds of little cars getting in the way all the time.
So next on our list seems to be a bottomless ticket machine and lots of little model policemen and women to keep a walkway clear. If we don’t get that we might have to make do with some new barriers to put up at either end.
Never mind, at least we’ve managed to hang on to those little cottages that came from Grandad’s old layout. There was a Parental move to throw them out and give us some new ones, because they said they looked shabby and were falling down. But we’ve hung on to them and maybe we’ll be able to find someone to mend them.
We haven’t got very much left from Grandad’s toys now, so it’s worthwhile trying to hang on to what we have got. Another thing on our list should be a special box to put these old relics in, to stop them getting damaged or broken when they are packed up along with everything else. That way we can make sure we look after them properly, like other children.
The Parents have special boxes for loads of things, so why shouldn’t we have at least one of our own?
I expect there are bound to be a lot more little houses in our stocking this year, and probably vouchers for a good many more, because the manufacturers seem determined to force them on us. The question has always been how many and where should we put them.
Unfortunately, there has been quite a bit of squabbling in the playroom about that in the past, so the Parents have been trying to draw up a set of rules to govern it. They did go as far as to ask us for our opinion, but then they completely ignored it.
Well, to be fair, we completely ignored the question for a long time and when we eventually got round to answering, they said it was too late. Typical.
The next thing we hear is that Uncle Roger, who owns the house the Parents rent, is going to be called in to decide whether this set of rules is fair or not. They have a silly word for it – ‘sound’. We’ll be showing them a thing or two about sound when we become teenagers and Santa brings us some decent speaker boxes.
As it is, they’re doing so little for us now that we have to spend our own pocket money just to keep ourselves supplied with the necessaries of life – crisps, sweets and smoothies.
Smoothies got axed recently and we’ve had to set up a new base of supply in the fridge. Would you believe it but the Parents are going to charge us rent for it. Scandalous.
Then there was the Great Pocket Money Scam. Uncle Roger had promised us some extra cash to make up for some he’d borrowed from us when he was in the sweet shop one day and found he hadn’t any cash with him.
Unfortunately he was a bit naive, and he gave it to the Parents to pass on to us. The first instalment they did just that, but now they’ve got wise to the idea and they are trousering it themselves on a regular basis. You can’t trust anyone these days.
So, last of all on our list for Santa, should be a licence to print our own money, so we can at least keep up the present standard of living. Of course, Uncle Roger and the Parents will no doubt go on about how it’s hard times at the moment and everyone has to accept not having so much.
Well, here in the playroom we would go along with that alright if it wasn’t for Uncle Roger still giving those dinner parties for all his mates from the bank, and the Parents forking out for a new sports car and a couple of fur coats for themselves.
After all, dear Santa, they are always saying that we are the future.
Merry Christmas.
|
