No, I didn’t get a Toyota 4Runner. Yes, I’m angry about it. Sure, I’ll get over it, eventually.
But let the record show, if being on the Nice List didn’t get me the vehicle I so desperately wanted, then I’m going to make 2024 the year I get my name on the Naughty List. In red ink. Permanent marker. Highlighted in yellow.
This isn’t a doomed-to-fail New Year’s resolution, I assure you. I don’t believe in resolutions anymore, ever since that one New Year’s Eve when I swore I would go a whole six months without potato chips, but only made it to six days before I found out there was a Jane Austen marathon on cable, featuring the 1995 BBC mini-series of Pride and Prejudice with Colin Firth as the brooding Mr. Darcy, who falls in love with the intelligent, independent and witty Elizabeth Bennett, played by Jennifer Ehle.
I was going to need Ruffles. The whole bag. Austen fans know you don’t go through this classic series without salty, crunchy satisfying snacks. And you don’t cheap out on no-name versions of potato chips. You commit. You bloat, willingly. It’s romantic.
Yep, that’s right, I have a wild side. Don’t tell anybody, but I’ve even tried the artisanal gluten-free potato chips cooked in avocado oil. Uh huh. I went there. And I liked it. That’s right, I said it.
But that’s not going to get me on the Naughty List for 2024. I’m going to have to try harder. I need to be the kind of bad that gets attention, that leaves a mark, so Santa knows I’m ready for four-wheel drive.
Naturally, I went to the person who knows me best to ask his advice on how I could get on the Naughty List. I immediately regretted letting the Carpenter in on my plan. I posed my concern as a very serious question, asked in earnest, hoping for genuine support.
The Carpenter’s response was considerably less serious and, if I’m being honest, not particularly helpful. What happens to men when they hear the word “naughty?” In between gasps of air from the laughter he was unable to control, spitting out words like “You? Naughty?” and “if only,” and “oh to be 20 again,” he didn’t seem to take my notion at all seriously.
I guess I didn’t look amused, because he took thigh-slapping, doubled-over roars down a notch to a chuckle, suggesting that perhaps I reflect on the series of curse words that erupted from my mouth on Christmas morning when I ran to the window to see the Toyota 4Runner was not in the laneway as I’d hoped. He felt that was a good start to my forecasted year of bad behaviour. Or, at the very least, bad language.
As to his other suggestions, well, I’d blush, but now that I’m all about the Naughty List, I’m open to negotiations. Marriage is all about negotiations. Wink.
I have the next 12 months to get Santa’s attention and land the big prize. Yes, I’m still talking about the Toyota 4Runner. Honestly, where does your mind go?
No more returning my shopping cart in the parking lot. No more holding the door open for strangers, and then apologizing for being in their way. No more letting traffic merge, even when they have the right of way. Bad girl.
Look out, 2024. I’m on a mission. No apologies.
