Earl and Nigel, separately, would sit on their front porches and scowl. As the world would go by before them, they could not muster a smile, instead, they chose to find regret and fault in everything before them. The postman was too fat to deliver their power bills with a spring in his step. Fault! The new family across the street had a juvenile person who would sing like murder in the shower. Fault! And as for the sparrows, they couldn’t even manage to catch the worm which was wriggling now on one of the man’s driveways. Fault!
It was the time of year when choruses were singing, ‘Peace on Earth’ and the pulpit was preaching, ‘Love is born’. And it was then the first miracle of the season happened: Earl got up from his chair without a single curse word. He ambled over to his side fence, where he called out to Nigel with an edge of bitterness in his voice, ‘You coming over later?’ The question itself may have seemed quite neighbourly, but the two had been feuding for years. Sometimes they would feud over sprinklers, or the shadows their houses would cast on the other’s property. Sometimes they would quarrel over smells which would waft from one kitchen window to the next, and there was that one time, many years ago now before Nigel’s knees would click, that he had peed on one of Earl’s rose bushes.
But as for Earl’s question, the answer did not need to be asked, as Nigel’s distrust and dislike of his neighbour meant he would always be answering in the affirmative. It was therefore all down to the timing. He had been watching a particularly informative documentary on ants, and the next instalment was set to air on the television that night. With that in mind, he called back, ‘I’ll be ‘round about six thirty’.
It was then that the second miracle of the season occurred: Earl back inside his house to sort out dinner, and he had exactly two microwave dinners left in his freezer. With dinner resolved, he took out an old rolling pin from the third drawer, covered it in tin foil and stuck it upright in a pot of dirt which had long-since housed a small plant, which had slowly succumb to death from lack of water – all life now wilted, it was the perfect place to stick the pole. He moved the pot to the centre of his table and with decorations sorted, he made himself a cup of coffee and waited for Nigel to arrive.
On making his way over to Earl’s house, Nigel quite deliberately walked through a muddy patch of dirt, and on entering his house, did not remove his shoes. He sat down at the kitchen table and with a familiarity that years of tradition had instilled, waited without speaking to be served his meal. The pair had little in the way of niceties to exchange, and so as the microwave bolognaise was dumped on the table, Nigel began, ‘You need to learn to salt the food you serve’.
And then, for the first time in many weeks, Earl smiled, ‘On February 12th your car brakes squealed and woke me up’. Nigel learned into the conversation, ‘On March 9th you leered at me from over the fence, and your ugly nearly sent me to my grave’. Earl responded, ‘On April 21st, you left your garden hose on and a trickle of water came onto my property’. From there, the name calling escalated – one called the other a ‘Goose’, then a ‘Clown’, then this evolved to become the ‘Ringmaster of the fools’, and so on.
As the meal came to its conclusion, and the name calling and sharing of grievances reached its height, the men got up from their seats and demanded of each other to, ‘take off your girly pants and prove you’re a man’. It would have been a cryptic phrase for any guests to that house, but they both knew this was an invitation to wrestle. To wipe the proverbial slate clean and to start counting grievances anew. Neither man had much speed, and as if in slow motion, they approached each other with arms outstretched before both tumbled to the floor. The match from the previous year was still in Earl’s mind – Nigel had used his elbow to pin his chest to the floor, and this year, Earl was determined for this not to happen again. And then, as the pair regained some composure after their fall – Nigel was pinning Earl to the floor with his elbow on his chest. Earl groaned and the men rose again to their feet, using the furniture about them to prop themselves up and certainly not helping the other.
Once upright, Nigel returned to the kitchen table feeling confident in his demonstration of strength, and Earl put the kettle on. The pair would have their customary coffee and contemplate silently the misery that the season offered them both. It was then that the third miracle occurred: Earl found two clean mugs! Returning to the table, the pair sat in silence and sipped their coffee, until Nigel had reason to anger, ‘Stop slurping your coffee’. The pair looked each other in the eye and both nodded in agreement; this had been a truly splendid Festivus.
