Deck the Halls with Boughs of…. la la… whatever…
Look at me, I see the irony.
Me, rallying against Christmas consumerism when I was born in one of its major mangers – otherwise known as a Bunnings warehouse – on a day when the parents of my maker were shopping for Christmas. I’m a product of the age! A symbol, you might say. And yet I feel I must show people it’s not about the plastic stuff! That a raging economy isn’t a panacea for society’s wider, badly recognised and dealt with, ills!
You see, I am a non-standardized, unregulated piece of craft. A one-off. ART, dammit. Distinctive. Beautiful in a bleak, disposable styrofoamy way. Look at my green plastic wobbly eyes! Tremble before me!
I can level you in a single critical, scrutinising glare! I can match Robert Hughes and then some. Hear me! HEAR ME!
You’re not listening, are you? Oh, I give up. Go on, put me on the tree. I only ask you weave one of those tree lights in under the dome, so my insides might blink like the heart you fail to recognise I have. If you could do that, I might be consoled. Also, put me out of reach of the cat, if you would be so kind. I do not wish to be eaten. Perhaps I could wish for a life where for several weeks of the year I can be pulled out of a box to be handled and put on display before being put away again. Only like the life-cycle of so many of the toys of this world. I shall sit in the branches and pretend not to be judging you.
See? Now I’m despondent. Bah! Fie to this existence! But you know what? I’d rather look like this than be dismembered, with certain body parts turned into plush, wired representations (one being a fictional red nose, let’s be honest) to then be stuck into the front bumper and windows of cars that drive around in smug proof that THEY are full of all the beneficence of the season! Don’t they realise they look ridiculous?! Who will make it stop?
Oh, I get so tired. So very tired. And I’ve only existed for six minutes.
