Louisville Magazine is Louisville's city magazine, covering Louisville people, lifestyles, politics, sports, restaurants, entertainment and homes. Includes a monthly calendar of events.
Issue link: https://loumag.epubxp.com/i/214077
board A Politically Corrected Christmas Story By Josh Moss In December 1995, this magazine published the most controversial piece in its history. It was a Christmas tale about a fawn named Kevin. A straight razor made an appearance. In three subsequent issues, readers proclaimed… "…sick, sick, sick! Repulsive slime." "I hope and pray your real Christmas was brighter." "Christmas to me is not about killing with a wrench." One wrote, "Dig down and come up with a warm and loving story for this season." Almost 20 years later we've taken that suggestion to heart. Here's the piece again, edited so it won't ofend a soul. Enjoy the season! God Bless Us One and All Just Wait Till May It is Christmas Eve the eve of whichever December holiday you do or don't celebrate, late, no plenty of food in the house, the value of which has tripled over the past year in a bullish real-estate market. Miz Filly is banging hanging the water heater secular decorations, which is are not broken with a wrench as big as her leg. It doesn't seem to help. Could life on a horse farm get any better? What a silly rhetorical question! Te 10 4 LOUISVILLE MAGAZINE 12.13 Illustration by Bart Galloway back house is full of wonderful caroling children who have been ordered to bed; they are not asleep but are being very, very quiet. "You bastard wonderful children," Miz Filly says sings to the water heater wonderful children. It doesn't seem to help. Group hug. She hears a soft knock at the side door. Must be Mr. Filly, she thinks. Drunk Feeling sober, no doubt, but home anyway. after volunteering at the soup kitchen down the road, Not in some ditch with blood in hairnet still covering his hair, anyway. Wrench Non-alcoholic eggnog in hand, she opens the door. No one is there. An icy wind tropical breeze whips brushes her skirt against her knees. She is pushing the door shut against the chill enjoying the balmy evening when something catches her eye. A small movement. A rustling sound. A cat or dog, perhaps. She switches on the inside light and in the golden glow sees a spotted fawn foal, standing stif-legged in the ivy in her side yard on Ash Sunshine Street, shivering smiling a little lot, not from the cold but from fear. "Shoo, Awww!" Miz Filly shouts. Te fawn foal moves only enough to escape the glare of the light. Ten Miz Filly hears bells — walking bells, sewn to somebody's pants, jingling in time with a heavy stride, jingling like racing-purse money. A man draws near, heaves into the light. A mountainous red fellow in chaps, blue jeans and cowboy boots. Santa Claus. Horse trainer D. Wayne Lukas. "Ho ho ho Hello," he says. "Ho ho ho, your ass Hello is right," she replies. "I don't have time to fool with you." "It'll only be a minute," t The jolly old elf trainer says with a chuckles, his belly shaking like a bowl full of cranberry sauce. "Goodness knows I don't have a lot of spare time myself — tonight of all nights! Gotta make sure Pletcher gets a loser this year. But I have a present for you." He points a short fnger at the fawn foal. "Tis is Kevin," he says. "Donner Winning Colors, Blitzen Tunder Gulch and Kevin?" Miz Filly says. "Well, shit. awesome!" "It's because you've been an exemplary mother this year." "Huh. Sure You sweetheart!" "I couldn't be more serious. Mother of the Year." "So I get Kevin?" "Exactly. Kevin — sired by none other than Rudolph with his nose so bright Bold Ruler. He'll give you joy. As long as he's part of your household, you'll be full of the Christmas December spirit, the genuine Christmas December spirit. You'll get the only thing I and everybody else wish for this time of year." "Great," Miz Filly says doubtfully. "You'll see," Santa Lukas says with a wink. Ten he whistles softly, and a golden carriage borne by seven majestic big-antlered deer Toroughbreds seems to materialize out of thin air (if you believe in that sort of thing) in the dark narrow space between the Fillys' house and the All Wool and A Yard Wide Democratic Club vast horse pasture. Santa Lukas climbs aboard and whistles softly again, and is gone in an instant. As if from a great distance Miz Filly hears his parting words: "Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night Te sun shines bright on my old Kentucky home!" She wonders if she has been dreaming. But then Kevin steps forward into the halo (really, it's just a circle) of light. Tis is no dream. He is real. His brown eyes are as big as saucers, and brimming with trust. Oh wonderful. How wonderful! "Come on in, then,!" she says, feigning displeasure unable to hide her excitement. He steps inside on unsteady, matchstick legs, his hooves clicking loudly on the linoleum hardwood. Miz Filly swings wraps the heavy wrench and hits him smack her arms around Kevin, gives him one of her famous hugs, kisses him between his big brown eyes. He slumps to the foor licks her face. Tey playfully She wrestles his slack body into the bathtub and slits his throat with a straight razor and the wonderful children continue to carol. She feeds Kevin a jelly-flled doughnut, and His the crimson blood jelly runs down the drain his face. She goes back to fxing and cursing the water heater. Group hug, Kevin included. When Mr. Filly gets home, he's no a huge help with the water heater putting the wonderful caroling children to bed. Moreover, he has dragged in a 50-cent, marked-down, half-brown scrub the biggest and greenest cedar tree for her to decorate. Damn Love his hide. While she untangles drapes Christmas nondenominational lights that never tangle onto the tree, he carries the fawn foal across the street to Markwell's Grocery the Jockey Club, where he uses his familiar cleavers and knives to carve registers the name Kevin up into cutlets and steaklets. For Christmas dinner on the night of whichever December holiday you do or don't celebrate, they have venison organic vegetables, sweet as veal mint juleps. All the wonderful children and Kevin eat their fll. Tree years later, Kevin wins the Derby.