I have said this before, but my fatal flaw is hubris. I have an over-confidence about my ability to do a lot of things. I think that I can do a lot of things better than the way they are currently done. I often say people should consult me on things. And you know what? Sometimes that hubris is validated. But then other times… I am humbled. And I am always humbled in very clear ways. Like I was with this gingerbread house.
I thought that I could pull off a Bake-Off-esque showstopper. A from-scratch gingerbread house that look cute and was well decorated. That had everything fit together neatly. That went above and beyond with the decorations. At one point, I thought I might do a decorative Christmas tree out of frosting and put it inside the house.
I was mistaken. Things did not go smoothly. I mis-measured the sides of the house, and then had to cut them to size, but then they broke and had to be repaired. Then, when I assembled it, everything was wonky and out of shape. The roof had a gaping hole in it. The back started to fall over. The chimney balanced on top with half an inch of clearance that I had to fill with icing. Once everything was assembled, I had no energy or vision for how to decorate it. I had already fallen so far from the canvas I had envisioned.
I piped on a door and windows that have… no right angles. Then, I started piping on the roof tiles. But then my hand started cramping, and the tiles started looking incredibly wonky. I threw on some sprinkles and pretended they looked like lights and called it a day. I was exhausted. And humbled.
So, all this to say: I would like to speak to some Christmas movie writers. Perhaps at Hallmark, but honestly anywhere. I’d talk to Dickens if I could. I think there needs to be a new kind of Christmas movie.
We’ve seen the Hallmark ones a million times before: lead character goes to their hometown that’s filled with people who are obsessed with Christmas. It’s probably called Santaville. And then they meet someone who they used to know from when they grew up in Santaville. This person is either named Nick or Noelle. They, of course, fall in love with Nick/Noelle. They also learn that the true meaning of Christmas is community/love/family/giving gifts/saving the local school/baking pies. Then they both put on green and red sweaters, make a Buche de Noelle, and get married on Christmas. I think.
Then there’s Christmas movies like It’s a Wonderful Life or A Christmas Carol that teach you to value what you have, and to care for the people around you. All well and good. But, dare I say, not lessons I need to learn! Maybe someday I’ll be a multi-millionaire bossing people around and being a jerk to kids with crutches. And then I can watch A Christmas Carol and get chills and then go give a turkey to the aforementioned kid with crutches.
I need a Christmas story that touches on some different morals. Tackle some different flaws other than being a selfish millionaire, or a depressed man who doesn’t see that his family loves him. Or, the flaw of… being a lawyer from a big city who has forgotten the magic of Santaville? I need a Christmas story that has a main character with hubris. Some Christmas Hubris.
Maybe the main character tries to build a gingerbread house and realizes they actually are bad at making gingerbread houses with no practice. They lose the gingerbread making contest in Santaville! Maybe they think they can single-handedly decorate their whole house with lights, but then learn that’s actually hard and their house looks bad. (Christmas Vacation almost did this, but he was pretty successful.) Maybe someone tries to build a toy for someone from scratch and they end up failing. Maybe, in a really madcap story, one of the elves thinks they can do Christmas better than Santa, and learn that it’s actually quite hard to do.
(I wrote that out, and then I realized that the movie Arthur Christmas almost touches on it. Grandsanta takes the sleigh out for a spin to prove that he can correct the error of the current Santa. He think that he and his old sleigh are better than the new-fangled technology, and he’s not driven by a love for Christmas, but by a desire to prove he can do it better. But, he has done Christmas before, so his hubris is not unfounded. So, I wouldn’t call it pure hubris, but… there must a reason he’s my favorite character!)
All I’m saying is… I’ve got a lot of ideas here! I think there’s some opportunities for some hubris-centered Christmas movies. Maybe someone should consult me!!
I think the moral of any of these stories would be: who cares if your hubris backfires. Because it’s Christmas. They didn’t win the gingerbread house competition, but it’s still Christmas. They’ve still got a gingerbread house. Or, their house is not the best-looking on the block, but it still has some lights, and they’re inside the house anyways. I’m not sure how to spin the elf-attempting-Santa’s-job movie yet. It can’t be a knock-off of Arthur Christmas, and it’s got to be uplifting, even if that elf could potentially ruin Christmas. But give me some time. I’ll workshop it.
I’ll post the recipes for the cookies I used in another post. In the meantime, here’s a video documenting my Christmas hubris downfall. I’ll use it to pitch my stories someday.