School Nativity Plays

I was talking to someone recently about elementary school concerts and how I probably wouldn’t want to attend another one that didn’t include one of my own young relatives. Don’t get me wrong, I vociferously support music in education, but I’m done with squeaky violin and recorder consorts playing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star. I probably sounded like a pompous ass, but I’ve been to so many over the years...

But then I recalled the glorious art form that is the school nativity play. These are supremely brilliant! The stable always contains a non-standard animal e.g. a lobster, one of the sheep usually mutates into a dalek or a T. Rex and attacks the shepherds, Joseph suffers a bout of early-onset-testosterone and decides to defend Mary’s honor against the villainous, cackling innkeeper, and the poor angel, suspended in a harness so tight that she’s turning blue, manages to hurl a wondrous arc of yellow and green bile straight into the baby’s crib, by which time the supervising teacher, who only got the job for upsetting a senior colleague, is fighting back tears and planning to stop off at the liquor store on the way to a hastily-booked therapy appointment. Add into the mix a gaggle of stage mums, two super-intent ‘video dads’ in frosty competition, a snoring grandad and lots of restive babies and you’ll understand why I think it’s the perfect way to spend an hour. 😂😂