Linda and I had a game we played. A fun game amongst two adults; a game that included our child. The game went like this.

Our son’s name is Jerry. He’s not our real child, nor is he adopted. I bought and paid for him. Jerry is a frog. A small, green, stuffed frog. Small enough to sit on the dashboard of our car when we travel. Small enough to fit in Linda’s knapsack when we go hiking. Small enough to be hidden around the house by each other, from each other. That’s how the game started.

Linda and I have kids of our own, but none together. We have no pets. Jerry became our de-facto child and pet, all rolled up into one soft, squishy action figure. Jerry partook in many action-adventures. He never complained. He played along. He played by letting us hide him from each other.

The first time Jerry hid was when I strategically placed him in Linda’s side of the bedroom closet. Cleverly and delicately placed between two garments, one eye peeking from his hiding place, Jerry peered out, waiting for Linda to find him. It took almost four hours for Linda to find and rescue Jerry.

The second time, Linda hid Jerry from me. Jerry crouched behind a box of cereal in a kitchen cupboard. Unfortunately, my breakfast consisted of eggs and bacon for two days, and I didn’t rescue him until the third day. He was happy to be free from the cupboard and happier not to be poured into a bowl and eaten.

We continued this game for close to a year. Sometimes we found Jerry quickly. Other times, a week might go by with Jerry out-of-site. The game finally came to a stop on a Friday evening. Playtime was over.

Linda and I were going out for dinner and dancing. Before we left our house, I hid Jerry in the nightstand light on Linda’s side of the bed. We were heading to the door to leave when Linda remembered something in our room. She ran upstairs, turned on a light, grabbed a pair of gloves, and came back downstairs. We donned our coats and headed to the car. As we opened the door to exit, I stopped. I smelled smoke. It seemed to be coming from upstairs. We both ran upstairs and turned on the ceiling lamp, just in time to rescue Jerry. His two hind legs were sitting on the bulb in the nightstand light. A faint whiff of smoke floated from the lampshade. Jerry was on fire!

I grabbed Jerry by the neck. Linda turned off the nightstand light. She grabbed Jerry from my hands, ran into the bathroom, and submerged both feet in the sink. Other than two holes burned into the bottoms of his feet, he survived. We almost lost Jerry along with our home and everything we owned that evening.

Jerry does not play hide-and-seek any more. He sits in a chair in the living room, glad not to be a pawn in our silly games. Our silly games in time ceased.

Last Christmas I bought an Elf on the Shelf figure for Linda. Let the games begin.

He grew up near Colby, Kansas. He worked on his family’s farm all of his young life, sowing, raising, and harvesting corn, never traveling far from the fields, never seeing what lay beyond the corn stalks and sunflowers that stretched forever in all directions. The farm was seventeen hundred miles from the Pacific Ocean; sixteen hundred to the Atlantic. He’d only seen images of beaches in stories he’d read in National Geographic. His one wish was to see a beach, if only just once.

His wish came true. In March of 1944, his eighteenth year, he received word from his uncle about an overseas job. He left the farm one cool spring morning. His first stop was North Carolina. He learned a new trade. Twelve weeks later, he left for England, a place he’d only read about as a boy.

He was not a boy anymore. He was a man. Ready to do man’s work. Soon after arriving in England, he boarded a boat. Ten hours later, the door of the boat opened. He saw his first beach.

I love you. I hate you.

Come sit at our table. Go back to where you came from.

Words are powerful.

You look beautiful tonight. Look what the cat dragged in.

We all have the power of words. More power though, depending upon who speaks them.

“We fight like hell. And if you don’t fight like hell, you’re not going to have a country anymore.”

“For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life . . . . “

Politicians often use lies – powerful words to those that believe them. Religious leaders use words of fear – other forms of power to rein in their flocks.

Give peace a chance. Let’s bomb them back to the Stone Age.

Words can be optimistic or terrifying. Soothing or painful. Soul warming or icy cold.

Sometimes, the most powerful words are those not spoken. I have defused many arguments with silence and a smile. Last weekend, my wife and I made a trip to Tucson. Because of my loathing for Interstate highways, I drove backroads. At one point, I steered our car down a muddy country road, surrounded by cotton fields. I knew we were not lost, but my wife disagreed. She didn’t say anything. She kept quiet and shot me ‘that look’. I understood. I turned left onto the first paved road, made our way to the Interstate, and arrived in Tucson on time.

Powerful words, indeed.

He did it! He finally came through. After all these years, the fat guy in the red suit granted my wish. Miracles do happen.

My particular miracle revolves around a Christmas wish I’ve has since I was a small boy. I’ve had my wish ever since I got my first set of small, green, plastic army men. One of the men amongst the platoon of troops stood erect, and carried a double-cylindrical pack on his back and a nozzle on the end of a hose in his hands. He was one bad dude. Since that day, I have wanted what he had. That first Christmas, I wrote to Santa Claus with but one wish. I wanted a flamethrower.

Santa ignored my initial request. Instead, he gave me socks and underwear. I was disappointed, but never gave up on my dream. I continued to ask Santa for a new flamethrower.

I can understand why Santa wouldn’t want a young boy of eight years to own such as destructive device. Young boys are still developing moral standards. A flamethrower in the hands of such a youth could have dire consequences. A sibling’s dolls could become scorched. A neighbor’s prized rose bush could be singed. Ants could get vaporized.

I continued to write to Santa asking for a flamethrower. Even during my teens, when I had pretty much stopped believing in him, I wrote, just in case I was wrong about the whole North Pole thing. Santa continued to disappoint me. I figured that he would not want such a weapon in the hands of a wayward adolescent. Teenaged boys back then tended to watch too many war shows on TV, such as Combat, Rat Patrol or Twelve O’clock High. The destruction meted out could be immense. The closest I came to having a flamethrower was of my own design. I taped a Bic cigarette lighter to a can of hairspray. A push of a button and a flick of the Bic produced a four-foot flame would make Vic Morrow smile.

I gave up writing letters to Santa as adulthood consumed me. Wives, kids, and jobs became my primary areas of responsibility. Even though a flamethrower would have been quite handy when my daughter’s suitors came around, I forgot about my dream. For close to forty years, I received other, more suitable gifts for Christmas, such as ties, coffee mugs, and more socks and underwear.

Now I’m retired. I still have a wife, but the kids are grown up and out of the house and my job is a recent memory. I have times on my hands. On a shopping trip to buy gifts for my grandson, I saw a gift from the past. I was a bag of small, green, plastic army men. Memories of my youth took over my thoughts. Later that day, I was in a hardware store. I found an item at the front counter that made me smile. I was a mini-flamethrower, the type used to start campfires, light candles, or ignite gas stoves. They had triggers for ignition, and a handle for an easy grip. All it needed was a large container of flammable mixture to become a bona fide flamethrower. I told my wife that I would like to have one of the ignitors for Christmas. When I arrived home, I sat down and wrote a letter to Santa. Once more, I asked for a flamethrower. I convinced him (lied) that I’d been good all year. I posted the letter the next day. I then quickly forgot about my foolishness.

Christmas Day arrived. After breakfast, my wife and I moved to the living room and opened presents by the tree. The last one I opened was from Santa. He got me the ignitor. Later that day, I retrieved a can of hairspray that I purchased earlier. I also got a roll of duct tape. Within minutes, I had my first and only flamethrower. I thanked Santa from the bottom of my heart, went outside, and tested my new toy. In a matter of seconds, I scorched the side of our house, singed a cactus, vaporized a spider, and badly burnt three fingers on my right hand. My wife took my flamethrower away from me and dismantled it. My dream is over.

I have a feeling I’m going to be getting socks and underwear next year for Christmas.