{"id":68048,"date":"2019-12-23T12:00:03","date_gmt":"2019-12-23T10:00:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/whisnews21.com\/?p=68048"},"modified":"2020-07-31T15:12:43","modified_gmt":"2020-07-31T15:12:43","slug":"jack-blanchards-column-the-christmas-town-3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/whisnews21.com\/index.php\/2019\/12\/23\/jack-blanchards-column-the-christmas-town-3\/","title":{"rendered":"Jack Blanchard’s Column: Pair of Christmas Shoes"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"jackcolumn2016\"A PAIR OF CHRISTMAS SHOES.<\/strong><\/h2>\n

A long time ago Misty and I took a holiday season job in a Miami
\ndepartment store in a poor neighborhood.
\nShe was the photographer who snapped and sold the pictures of the
\nchildren on Santa’s lap. I was Santa.
\nThe Santa suit and the whiskers were hot,
\nbut it was an unforgettable experience.<\/p>\n

Little poor kids would tell me their dreams,
\nwhich I knew could not come true for them, at least this year,
\nbut they had faith in Santa,
\nand even a “maybe” from me made their eyes sparkle.
\nSomehow, I felt guilty.<\/p>\n

One little boy asked me how come Santa Claus is white.
\nI told him I hoped he wouldn’t hold that against me,
\nand he assured me he wouldn’t.<\/p>\n

There were always a few raggedy strays
\nwandering around the toy department,
\ngiggling and touching all the magical things
\nthat would soon belong to someone else.<\/p>\n

Some of them laughed and pointed at me, but never came too close.
\nOthers showed off to their pals by climbing right up on my lap,
\nas if they weren’t scared at all.<\/p>\n

One little girl, dressed in filthy rags, was too small to climb up on my knee,
\nso I lifted her up. She weighed nothing.
\nI wondered if she was old enough to talk, as she just smiled at me.<\/p>\n

Obviously, she was alone and uncared-for.
\nI asked her where her mommy and daddy were and she said, “Drunk”.
\nThen she confessed her love for me.<\/p>\n

I asked her what she really wanted most for Christmas,
\nand she lisped, “New shoes”.
\nShe wasn’t wearing any this winter.
\n“Merry Christmas! Ho-Ho -Ho”, I choked,
\nas she climbed down to be replaced by the next in line.<\/p>\n

When business tapered off I searched the whole store for the little girl,
\nto buy her a pair of new shoes, but I was too late.
\nShe had disappeared and I never saw her again,
\nexcept in my mind every Christmas.<\/p>\n

Jack Blanchard<\/p>\n

\n

\"jackmistysunhat001\"<\/p>\n

Jack Blanchard & Misty Morgan… <\/strong><\/p>\n

Home Page: http:\/\/www.jackandmisty.net<\/a> Awards: Grammy, Billboard, CMA, BMI, ASCAP. Mastering & restoration studio: 352-530-2068. \u00a0Email: jackandmisty@gmail.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u00a9 Jack Blanchard, 2016.<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A PAIR OF CHRISTMAS SHOES. A long time ago Misty and I took a holiday season job in a Miami department store in a poor neighborhood. She was the photographer who snapped and sold the pictures of the children on Santa’s lap. I was Santa. The Santa suit and the whiskers were hot, but it was an unforgettable experience. Little poor kids would tell me their dreams, which I knew could not come true for them, at least this year, but they had faith in Santa, and even a “maybe”<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":62260,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/whisnews21.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68048"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/whisnews21.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/whisnews21.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/whisnews21.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/whisnews21.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=68048"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/whisnews21.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68048\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":73617,"href":"https:\/\/whisnews21.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68048\/revisions\/73617"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/whisnews21.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/62260"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/whisnews21.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=68048"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/whisnews21.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=68048"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/whisnews21.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=68048"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}