The Time Mike Pence Saved Christmas
Graphic by DonkeyHotey, CC BY-SA 2.0
The following story is meant to be humorous, and is not intended to represent the real-life Mike Pence. As far as we know he does not do a spot-on Elmo impression when he has two lungsful of helium.
When the nights become long and the snow piles high on our rooftops and the family gathers round, the story they most want to hear is about the time my good friend Mike Pence saved Christmas.
Also, remind me to tell you about the time Romney had piles some time.
As I was saying, my great friend Mike Pence once saved Christmas, and it’s just as delightfully bizarre as you’d imagine, equal parts Elf and James Bond.
When we were at the University, we used to winter in my ancestral home of Dublin, New Hampshire, making Guipure Cluny lace with my Nan. Very ornate class of stuff, you understand. Bobbin loom lace weaving has been in my family for generations and, as anyone who cares about women’s fashion can surely tell you, you don’t skimp on quality when it comes to lace. No lace is better than cheap lace, that’s my motto. Don’t believe me? The motto on our family crest is Lacinia Nulla Est Melior Quam Insumptuosus Licio Plexueris, which caused something of a row with the people at Westinghouse once upon a time, but I digress. Frequently.
During our first year, Mike would regale my sisters and Booper and me—Nan was too deaf even then to appreciate it—with ex tempore; recitations from the Decameron, but by the time we’d got to the ninth tale on the eighth day the antics of Buffalmacco were no longer entertaining and it was decided that we needed some other occupation in the dark, New England winter.
It was thus that we found ourselves, Mike Pence, and Booper and myself, as the winter caretakers at a living history museum in Portsmouth. It was a little village in the city, a collection of historic homes and buildings spanning the last few centuries, but instead of the bustle and noise of summer, it lay in gray and bleak winter.
We were much assisted by Mike’s great interest in vintage home repair. A regular disciple of Norm Abrams, he was then. Turned a lathe like he had one in the womb. Must have been uncomfortable for the other Mother Pence, but again I digress.
I remember the day as if it was yesterday. We we’re in a World War II era shop, but upstairs in the living quarters, when I saw a small sticky note. I assumed it was one of Booper’s at first, naturally. Booper is in the habit of naming all his appliances but forgetting their names, thus he gives them all name tags so he can remember. It’s a silly practice of course; they’re all named Bernard. At any rate, I picked it up and saw written—in the most delicate hand you can imagine, mind—on it, “23 MHz. Jingle.”
What the devil does that mean? says I.
Well, Mike said. That’s a frequency in the shortwave band. Perhaps we should have a listen.
This is a recent note, I said as Mike Pence set up the multi-band radio he always had with him. There’s no dust on it or anything.
I agree, Friend Bryan. And I detect it was written with some urgency. The handwriting is exquisite, but it has all the tell-tale signs of a message written in haste. See the crossbar on the H and the way the three suggests the writer was in a rush. It was all written by a person with remarkably small hands, and who is left-handed.
I was flabbergasted, but before I could question it he tuned in the frequency. We listened to the static expectantly.
Then, in thin and wobbly tones we heard a brief melody.
“Here Comes Santa Claus”! How many notes was that? Booper shouted in excitement.
Five I said.
Five notes! A personal best!
We shushed him.
There came, over the radio a high nasal voice. It spoke a series of letters and Mike Pence, with pen in hand, wrote them down. They were these:
NURXR IWKLG WPAMG ACRCW AVLWJ XKSLW RVQGY KNZ
We stared at the sequence as Mike turned off the radio.
What do you make of it, Michael? I asked.
Hm, he said, stroking his chin. It’s a code of some sort. If it’s a one-time pad we’re hopelessly lost as to its meaning, but given the apparent urgency of its sending, perhaps it uses a simpler, but no less clever cypher. Giving it a brief glance, I can say definitively it is not in the Atbash Cypher. Nor is it a classic Caesar Shift, though it may be a variation upon that cypher.
Michael, I said, looking at the original note we had found. Why does this say “Jingle” on it?
Bryan, he exclaimed. You are brilliant!
I’ve never been accused of such a thing before Michael but if you—
A key, he interrupted. It’s a key! This is very helpful.
Silence obtained for a few pregnant moments as we started at the coded message.
Mike, Booper said timidly.
Yes, Booper?
What’s a Caesar Shit?
Shift, Booper, shift. It’s a cypher, millennia old. It didn’t use a key though some of the cyphers that developed from it—here he paused, the idea upon him—some of those developed from it did!
He was enraptured, the solution bright and fresh upon his mind.
Vigenère! he said.
Michael, I said. Are you having a stroke?
No, I’m of sound mind, Bryan. Vigenère was credited with the creation of a variation on the Caesar shift which was dependent on a shared key. Let’s see what the output of this cypher is when we feed it into the Vigenère!
It gave us this text:
EMERG ENCYA LLRET URNTO NPASA PXMAS INDAN GER
Bah! I despaired. It’s just as inscrutable as before!
Is it? Mike said, a twinkle in his eye.
You can scrute it?
He wrote carefully on his paper these words:
EMERGENCY ALL RETURN TO NP ASAP XMAS IN DANGER
What is NP? Booper asked, chewing on a fifty-year-old chocolate bar he’d nicked from the store below.
Jingle, Mike said. Christmas in danger. NP. Wait!
You don’t suppose? I asked, knowing not what he supposed, but wanting to appear to suppose the same.
I do, he said. I do suppose. North. Pole. Santa Claus is in some sort of trouble!
In a moment I was on the phone with Dick Richards, who quickly arranged yacht, icebreaker and helicopter transportation that would have us at the North Pole on the twenty third. He asked no questions. Richards was nothing if not discrete.
On the morning of the twenty third of December of that year we found ourselves warmed by a blazing fire in the private rooms of Santa Claus in conversation with Mrs. Kringle more warmed by a steady supply of hot chocolate brought to us by an endless series of elves.
How is it, Booper asked, working well into his second dozen of chocolate chip cookies. That a fourth century Greek bishop comes to have a temporal wife?
Let us, Mike said, eschew the intricacies of theology for the time being. Mrs. Claus, as your husband has suffered from an anxious swoon, what is the difficulty that threatens Christmas?
I daresay, she said, sipping from her hot chocolate with an endearing delicacy. There is a great demand among the children for a Tickle Me Elmo doll. This was the gift of the year until sabotage by a leprechaun who infiltrated the elf ranks, by the name of Punch O’Neal—
At this I scoffed and rolled my eyes. Punch O’Neal was a notorious trickster and anarchist.
The devil, I said.
The devil, indeed, said Michael. Say more.
Somehow, Mrs. Clause continued, he managed to erase all the voice recordings. Not a single elf has been able to match the correct tone! My voice is too feminine. Perhaps one of you might be able to do it?
We each did our best Elmo. We referred to ourselves in the third person. We tried our best to make inane observations of the obvious sound profound, Booper was unable to make the word blanket not sound lascivious. Mike Pence was the only one to get the patterning right, but his voice was much too low. I sounded like a tubercular bleating lamb.
Then a familiar voice boomed from the hallway.
Ho, ho ho! What have we here, said Santa. The last of our Elmo impersonators?
Yes, dear, said Mrs. Claus. And they’ve failed, sadly, though it was a valiant effort.
Well, time, tide and Christmas wait for no man. They did no better or worse than I; I sounded like Wilford Brimley after a balloon of helium! “Elmo says to take care of your diabetes, it’s the right thing to do!” Ho, ho ho!
Helium, you say? Michael said, interrupting the general laughter. Perhaps that might be the missing link, the secret sauce to my otherwise spot-on impression. Have you any balloons?
But of course! said the jolly old elf. No elf workspace would be complete without a bevy of balloons.
An elf was dispatched and soon returned with several balloons, the thin ribbons of which he clutched in his tiny, little hands. These were not, I knew then, the elves who headed to the Gray Havens.
Will this save Christmas, Santa? an elf asked.
We can only hope, Santa said. We can only hope.
It was the first time that Santa looked truly hopeful that evening.
Well, after so many “Oh, boy!”s and “That tickles”es out of Michael, Santa was full of mirth. The recordings were implanted into the dolls and a Merry Christmas was had by all!
Some time I should tell you about the other time Booper and I spent as winter caretakers! Or have I already told you that one?
