A boom on Mouseland’s Christmas wish list
Mouseland’s missing Christmas boom — a seasonal story based on the original fable by T.C. Douglas and updated to reflect politics in December, 2013.
Breathlessly, Alfie the Elf, burst into Santa’s workshop with a terrified look on his face. “It’s gone, Santa,” wailed Alfie. “It’s just disappeared. No one knows where it’s gone and some tell me it’s still there. But believe me, Santa, it’s gone!”
“Calm down, Alfie,” said Santa, who sometimes got rather annoyed with his vertically challenged helpers — especially since they successfully got the North Pole’s essential services legislation thrown out a few years back. “What’s gone?”
“The boom!” Alfie cried. “Brad Cat’s boom! It’s gone. It’s not in your sled and no one can seem to find it!”
Santa’s brow furrowed. He knew the “boom” meant even more to the rest of the critters of Mouseland than Brad Cat himself, who asked Santa for a boom every year.
You see, Mouseland wasn’t always a booming place. Nor was it even necessarily a place ever dominated by mice. Most of Mouseland was made up of chickens and coyotes and gophers and rabbits and skunks and weasels who were busily transferring their last bit of excessive profit to offshore bank accounts before closing up their offices for the holidays.
And there were cats — mostly black cats, because all the white cats in Mouseland had run off to chase their pretty, fluffy white Persian cat leader named Justin.
Long ago, when Mouseland was still a very, very poor place, along came a little ol’ church mouse named Tommy who was as politically shrewd as he was kind. It was Tommy Mouse who discovered that as long as he could appeal to all of Mouseland’s poor critters — and, of course, keep the cats fighting among themselves so they would split the anti-mouse vote — the mice could rule Mouseland for as long as they wanted.
This worked for decades, as the poor creatures of Mouseland became more and more reliant on Mouse governments to light their burrows, run their buses and even mine their cheese.
However, in recent years, Mouseland’s critters discovered they were richer they could possibly imagined and maybe didn’t like government doing everything for them. And at about the same time, all the cats realized they would be better if they were in just one party. Brad Cat became the Cat leader just as all the world developed a taste for most everything that Mouseland had.
Most everyone in Mouseland seemed happy and Brad Cat’s approval rating soared even higher than Santa’s — largely because Brad Cat gave away more stuff than Santa.
But what most didn’t realize is that Mouseland’s success mostly had to do with the boom Brad Cat got from Santa for each year.
“The boom isn’t lost,” Santa said calmly. “I just haven’t decided whether Brad Cat should get a boom this year. I’m not sure whether he is on my naughty or nice list.”
“But didn’t Brad Cat promise to help dump the trough that the swine in the Senate have been eating at?” asked Alfie.
“And hasn’t he said a whole bunch of other good things? Didn’t he talk about fixing the old critters’ homes and setting up a real savings account for all of Mouseland creatures, great and small? Didn’t he even ask the fat cats running the cheese mines to take less money so they wouldn’t have to lay off so many hard-working critters?”
“That’s the problem, Alfie,” Santa said. “Brad Cat did a lot of talking and said a lot of popular things this year to make himself even more popular. But I’m not so sure he really did all that much.
“And that stunt that Brad Cat and Ken Cat pulled with Mouseland’s books was very naughty. I now have my own adverse opinion as to whether they should be on the nice list.”
“Nothing for Ken, the finance cat, either!” moaned Alfie.
“Well, he’s a Ukrainian Cat, Alfie, so I still have two weeks to decide about Ken Cat’s present. And I haven’t made up my mind about whether Brad Cat gets his boom, either.”
“But if Brad Cat doesn’t get his boom, all Mouseland critters will suffer,” cried Alfie.
“I know it will be hard on Mouseland critters, but they have survived in years when they didn’t get a boom,” Santa sighed. “Brad Cat has gotten his boom every year. And that’s just not fair to the other critter leaders across the land that don’t get always a boom.
“Sheesh, didn’t I also give Brad Cat that Grey Cup he always asks for, too? Maybe it’s time for Brad Cat to show he can manage Mouseland without a boom. I need to think about this one a bit more.”
“Santa, you can’t do that, Santa ...” Alfie begged.
But Santa had already disappeared into his office and closed the door.