There I was, driving west on Fred Waring Blvd in Palm Springs. With my white cowboy hat firmly planted on my head, I leaned on the stirrups of my Subaru Outback and came to a stop. I had been riding fancy that mornin in my Outback, chasing prairie dogs and tumble weed to clear a path to the shopping center.
A young man, perhaps 27 or 28 was waiting for the cross walk light to illuminate so he could cross the street and plunge headlong into the joyous season of buying . . and giving. He carried a white sack of necessities that stretched across his front. He was short and a little pudgy . . a good look for Christmas. He had black horn-rimmed glasses and his pudgy feet were encased in rubber sneakers as he jumped into the cross walk and started to cross the street, unbeknownst to me!
I was making a left turn in my hopalong vehicle when I came to a screeching stop. It was the pudgy young man. He looked at me as I was stranded in the oncoming lane of traffic and he started gesticulating and shouting something. My windows were up and my steed’s engine prevented me from hearing his obviously cheerful Christmas epithets. I waved to him. This acknowledgement was evidently the thing that sent him into a Merry Christmas tizzy. He was jumping up and down and, unfortunately, in his Christmas exuberance was blocking me so I couldn’t cross the crosswalk and exit the intersection.
I noticed an oncoming car approaching, so I tried to pull around him and leave. But, his happy Christmas dance took him in front of my car and prevented me from moving. I didn’t want to offend this portly gentleman (perhaps, he was Santa in disguise casing the shopping center!), but the oncoming car was coming. It shifted into second as it bore down on my white stallion. I could see us ending up in the shopping center parking lot, covered with snow, only to be fished out in spring after the snows of winter had melted in Palm Springs.
Suddenly, there was an opening. Topper whinnied, rose up and and went around Santa in the crosswalk, seconds before the marauding, oncoming car careened into the parking lot of the mall.
‘Merry Christmas, ho, ho, ho’ was all that could be heard from the Christmas cowboy as he rode off into the morning sun.