12/25/2023
Merry Christmas 2024
I vividly remember thinkin' real hard, n' tryin' to bring my understanding of the nature of th' size of the population of th' world, and th' vast scope of the physical size of our earth into some sort of focus with respect to Santa’s epic yearly ride. And more specifically, noting the reality of population growth, just how likely he, Santie Claws, which is what I called him, would be to still make it by my house that particular night when I was 5 or so. All th' while noting that there was only 24 hours in a day n' them reindeer might not be quite fast enough to get'er done again this year.
I also recall wonderin' how much grace he might have for little fellas like me that weren’t perfectly not naughty, tho sadly not perfectly consistently nice to my own fearful inventory.
Fast forward to a week or so ago when that memory floated up through my grey matter database and mingled with the happy thought that I just might be able to get some help with this query from my new friend Art who I’ve found to possibly be that actual smart.
Well, I up n' rang Art, n' asked him if he reckoned he could figure out a ballpark on that one, n' he started in on how hard it was n' he’d have to know how many chimneys n' we finally set about estimating n' dickering till he comes up sayin' how he figured Santie was gonna have to visit like, I don’t remember exactly but, like 4 billion stops n' it would be over 7 thousand every second even if he had a year n' not a day. Well, I knew I was at least makin' progress so I pressed him harder n' had him figure out how fast the sleigh’d need to go, to which he starts squirming n' goin' on 'bout estimating n' I said go n' to my recollection, we come up to somewhere north of 700 times th' speed of light, which everybody knows is a hundred n' eighty-six thousand miles a second so this is an unbelievably high rate of speed.
Ole Einstein figured out that as you approach the speed of light time slows down n' when you go past it, time starts to go backwards n' when you get on out there to 700 times th' spd. o' sound, you are dealing with some wicked high acceleration and deceleration at each stop, n' probably gonna be at least some risk of a little stressing of the actual fabric of the space-time continuum.
I was tryin' ta decide if I should push on or let Artie cool his head a little bit before I asked what kinda energy we talkin' when it occurred to me that we still gotta address th' way that tiny sled has to carry everybody’s stuff n' I realized that it just has to take a miracle to do this, and not in a year's time but every year in one night.
When you remember the miraculous nature of a little fat guy with 8 deer pullin' off somethin' like that you realize it takes childlike faith to believe a story like that.
And on this same day we have also chosen to remember and celebrate another more wonderful miracle. The miracle of the virgin birth of The Christ of Calvary, The Creator of the universe, who is the Alpha and Omega, The Light of The World, and the one who spoke these words:
“Verily I say unto you, Whosoever shall not receive the kingdom of God as a little child, he shall not enter therein.”
Mark 10:15
As mommies and daddies around the world provide evidence of the hope their children hold on to, of a visit from a Jolly Ole Elf, another much greater, more wonderful miracle, still happens every year, for weeks all the way around the world, when you will hear folks of every religion or no religion or belief at all, proclaim the name of th' real Reason for The Season.
Merry Christmas, from the Wigginses my dear friends.
---
Verily I say unto you, Whosoever shall not receive the kingdom of God as a little child, he shall not enter therein.