Christmas, everyone's favorite marketing campaign masquerading as a halfway meaningful religious holiday, is full of iconic characters- both trademarked and untrademarked. Rudolph and Frosty come from catchy holiday jingles, Jack Frost comes from old folk tales, and Santa is a characterized version of Saint Nick from the fourth century created by Coca-Cola. Each have their roles to fulfill, save for Frosty who seems to not do much but question his existential being and hang out with kids when weather permits. Sadly, there is one Christmas figure seemingly everyone has neglected.
Every year around the holidays, my family goes to a display of Christmas lights. It's rather impressive the number of decorative and colorful lights set up. You drive the path and are greeted by colorful interpretations of elves, snowmen, reindeer, and several Santas all made entirely out of Christmas lights. There's even free cookies, hot chocolate, and a live Santa Claus you can let your kids sit on if you aren't the type to question suspect elderly men wearing costumes to attract young children. We've been going here for years, and it simply doesn't seem like the holiday season without visiting it. However, one decorative light display had always left our family confused.
This light display showcases a beaver chewing through a tree that then falls to the ground. None of us could gather as to what a seemingly nondescript beaver knocking down a tree had to do with any holiday during the season. And yet there it was, continuously biting through a tree year after year. It never fails, every time we come to see the lights that same light-up beaver is biting through the exact same light-up tree.
Eventually, we decided this furry creature must be none other than the Christmas Beaver. Each year, we drove out to the same location and anticipate the appearance of the Christmas Beaver, chomping down on that same tree. We even stopped calling the outing “going to see the lights” and instead say “going to see the Christmas Beaver.” It became just as important as setting up a Christmas tree or baking cookies. It isn't Christmas until we've bore witness to the Christmas Beaver. He become not only a figure of Holiday spirit, but an idol we all seemed to envision with holy power.
So what does the Christmas Beaver do, exactly? It's simple. The Christmas Beaver chops down the Christmas trees and presumably gives them to Christmas tree dealers across the country so every family who can afford one can buy a Christmas tree. Santa delivers gifts, Rudolph leads the reindeer, Jack Frost creates the snow and cold air, and the Christmas Beaver cuts down trees with his teeth.
Much like Santa Claus, the Christmas Beaver keeps his personal list of who he dubs naughty and nice. Nice families who cause no harm to furry woodland creatures may purchase a tree and go about their holidays unscathed. His method of punishing transgressors, though is much more harsh than the fat man's. Those he deems naughty in his divine vision are gnawed in half with his mighty beaver teeth and then used in his dam in the North Pole. The naughty are then known as “the dammed.”
Every year, we are bombarded with the same animated specials depicting beloved mascots like the Grinch and Frosty the Snowman. But where, I ask, are the animated specials for the Christmas Beaver?
I demand that a clay-animated hour long TV special dedicated to the tale of the Christmas Beaver. This needs to happen to appease the holy Chistmas Beaver before he goes on a rampage and uses us all for his festive people-dam.
