Christmas Recollections, Wrappings, and Rantings

Hearing Christmas carols on the radio, singing them at church, or watching Christmas choir programs on television are all highlights of the season, for me. While I do have a couple of favorite secular Christmas songs, I would be hard pressed to name any sacred carol that holds the number one spot for me — I love so many of them equally!

I do not, however, have any difficulty identifying my least favorite carol.

Well, it is not so much “least favorite” as much as it is one that became rather tarnished due to (cue ominous organ music)…The Wicked Trio.

When I was little, singing Christmas carols at church was one of my favorite activities. I enjoyed singing, anyway, but I particularly loved the songs we sang about angels, shepherds, wise men and, of course, Jesus’ birth. Perhaps my delight was founded on my being so attracted to a good story. Unlike the usual Sunday hymns, which I thought just warbled about theology and stuff, the Christmas carols told a good story.

My imagination was captivated by “herald angels.” The fact that I did not know what a herald angel even was made them of greater magnificence to me. I shivered when I pondered “poor shepherds in fields as they lay” in what must have been very cold weather, and I was relieved that “The First Noel” was said by the angels to certain them.

Yes, I said, “certain them.”

You see, in my youthful mind, “certain” was not synonymous with “particular” or “specific.” Since I had heard it used most frequently as a synonym for “assured” or “confident,” as in “I am certain those angels just said, ‘Noel’ to us,” I rationalized the carol must mean the angels were assuring the shepherds that there really was a baby somewhere in a manger. (As an adult, I know, of course, that the angels WERE assuring the shepherds of the birth of Jesus, but I doubt they were doing this by certaining them. It was simply a case of my being a “Verber” at an early age.)

But I digress.

I have no idea how many years passed with me singing about those certaining angels before I realized my error, but I know it was quite early in my childhood when The Wicked Trio, three boys who relished getting into mischief during Sunday School, began the assault on another of my favorite carols: “We Three Kings.”

The slow, pondering cadence of the stanzas, sung in a minor key, introduces us to “We, three kings, of Orient are.” The introduction proceeds to explain that “bearing gifts, we traverse afar” before informing us that these travelers have covered “field and fountain, moor and mountain, following yonder star.”

As we plodded through the stanzas, much like the camels must have plodded through the sands of the desert, our youthful voices shifted to a more lilting rhythm as the carol, switching to the relative Major key for the chorus, called us to gaze at the “Star of wonder, star of night, star with royal beauty, bright.”

Oh, the marvel of that song! Oh, how it captured the feel of the long, tedious journey and reminded us of the promised reward for perseverance! Oh, how The Wicked Trio wreaked havoc on its beauty!

This Wicked Trio — whose names I shall not reveal as I am hopeful that they have, in their maturity, seen the error of their ways and repented of their wickedness — this Wicked Trio, I say, changed the words of the song so that it went thusly:

We three kings of Orient are,
Tried to smoke a rubber cigar.
It was loaded
And exploded.
BOOM!

There was no chorus, because they immediately went to the second stanza which began: “We two kings of Orient are…” and which, predictably, ended with another loud “BOOM!”

The final verse began with the grammatically unfortunate “I one king of Orient are…” and continued to sing how I, also, tried to smoke a loaded rubber cigar which exploded with a final BOOM!

The end of the song was signaled by a short pause, followed by their singing the first two words of “Silent Night.”

The Wicked Trio always cackled with glee after they finished, while I sat agape at the magnitude of their profane behavior, silently praying to be spared from the lightning which would surely strike them anon. In the meantime, our teacher would simply cluck her tongue and say, “Boys!”

Many years passed. I grew older and, perhaps, a little more inured to the wonder of those carols. Of course, I continued to sing them when the season suited, and I still enjoyed singing them. But, perhaps my love of them was eclipsed by the pomp and circumstance which was now part and parcel of the singing. I was involved with a choir whose arrangements of those carols were much more sophisticated and glorious than those of my childhood. Further, we wore magnificent robes, carried candles while singing, and were accompanied by a full orchestra, all of which added to the grandeur.

Also, we never sang “We Three Kings.”

In fact, I had all but forgotten my formerly-favored carol until one year when I was directing the fifth and sixth grade choirs at church. The Coordinator of the children’s music programs wanted us to have all the elementary children’s choirs present a Christmas pageant — something that had not been done in our church for a long time. Each choir would be responsible for portraying, and singing about, a different group in the Christmas story. For example, the youngest choirs were assigned to be Animals, such as sheep, donkeys, and doves, and would sing “The Friendly Beasts.” Other groups would be Shepherds (“My Sheep Were Grazing”); Villagers (“Oh, Little Town of Bethlehem”); and Angels (“Angels We Have Heard on High”). That left my group, with the oldest children, to provide the Wise Men. And our song was to be — you guessed it — “We Three Kings.”

As I said, I had all but forgotten about this particular song, so I had also pretty much forgotten about The Wicked Trio.

Until our rehearsal.

As the fifth and sixth graders lifted their young voices in harmony, I was suddenly overcome by an absolutely overwhelming desire — make that need — to laugh.

I tried to re-focus, but my efforts were subverted by visions of three guys standing around with smoke-blackened faces and the exploded ends of cigars sticking out of their mouths. I started to snicker. I bit my tongue to stop myself. It didn’t help. A sort of snortle noise escaped which I tried to disguise as a cough. My eyes started watering from the effort to remain serious. The more the children sang, the more I remembered that blasted rubber cigar, the futility of trying to smoke it, and the unabashed glee with which The Wicked Trio sang of it all — and I couldn’t control myself anymore. I had to leave the room and find a place where I could collapse in a paroxysm of laughter.

Even today, I still have tremendous difficulty with that song. As lovely as it is, and as much as I love the story it tells, sooner or later I hear The Wicked Trio caroling their dastardly version, and I start laughing.

As I write, it occurs to me that, maybe — just “maybe,” mind you — I do have a favorite sacred carol after all. The thing is, dearly as I love all the others, “We Three Kings” brings, simultaneously, laughter (over some shenanigans), joy (over recollections of my youth), and wonder (at the miraculous story that this, and other carols, tell). Besides, no other carol instantly transports me back to childhood as quickly as this one does.

Looks like the tarnish may have worn off.

So, “Wassail!” to those Three Kings of old, and “Wassup” to another, more recent and less exalted Trio, with gratitude for your contributions to my Christmas cheer.

Merry Christmas.

BOOM!