Author: Jenni bellisimanotte@yahoo.com
Category: General, Margaret’s POV
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: The West Wing and its characters are the property of Aaron Sorkin, John Wells Productions, Warner Brothers, and NBC. No infringement is intended on the author’s part.
Archive: At my website, which is part of Jeanine’s universe: http://helsinkibaby.topcities.com/Jenni/leomargaret.htm
Feedback: The finest of holiday gifts.
Summary: Scrooge had the ghosts of Christmas past, present, and future. We have the ghost of December 23rd.
A/N: This got stuck in my head and lasted through a day of hard work and a night of making an insane number of gingerbread people. This is for my colleagues, ten of the most brilliant minds and beautiful souls in the business. I love you all and couldn’t ask for more than your friendship, love, and willingness to "march into hell for a heavenly cause."
A/N #2: The title of this story comes from the Christmas song, "Find Our Way Home" recorded by the Trans-Siberian Orchestra. Lyrics are provided at the end of the story.
For a moment, I thought we’d dodged the bullet. Whoops, bad choice of words. Let’s just say I thought we were free and clear. That for once we’d escaped the unfortunate tradition that has dogged each holiday season of the Bartlet Administration. This tradition has nothing to do with musicians in the lobby, mistletoe over doorways or endless rounds of Yuletide trivia with the President. Those are pleasant traditions . . . this one decidedly less so.
You see, Ebenezer Scrooge had the ghosts of Christmas past, present and future. We here in the West Wing have the ghost of December 23rd. It started with Toby and a funeral for a homeless Korean War veteran who died in Lafayette Park wearing an overcoat Toby had passed on to Goodwill. The next year saw the entire Senior Staff and assistants holding our collective breath as we watched Josh begin to unravel in the wake of a PTSD tsunami the size of Hurricane Andrew.
As for last year . . . I’m hardly the one to provide an objective picture of December 23, 2001. I spent the day once again holding my breath; this time in an effort to maintain some sense of decorum as my boss was grilled by a Congressional Witch-Hunt . . . er Subcommittee investigating the Multiple Sclerosis debacle. The end of that day brought confusion as the Chairman gaveled the Committee into an early recess and the Majority Council stood on the dais looking for all the world like the keeper of the world’s biggest secret. Sorry, Mr. Calley, I’m still in possession of that crown.
So here we are on the Eve of Christmas Eve. All day long I’ve been waiting for the proverbial other shoe to drop. For the crisis to thunder down upon us with dire consequences a thousand fold. Instead of funerals and Josh going full throttle at the President, we have a snowstorm, the President holed up with Dr. Keyworth (something I’m not supposed to know), Toby’s father come to visit and Toby in a swivet over his uninvited guest, and a couple of Don Quixotes and one ever-faithful Sancho Panza. Just my luck, the ghost of December 23rd decided to add a couple of damned windmills to the holiday; massive HHS budget reform and peace in the Middle East. Why not *two* freaking Nobel Prizes in 2003? I’ll just start working on that best seller in my spare time and we can go for the hat trick.
The clock ticked over to Christmas Eve while I wasn’t looking. I’m in my third hour of shuttling between my office and Leo’s, delivering memos, data, policy briefs, and coffee as he and Josh try to create their very own Christmas miracle in Bethlehem. These men do not know the meaning of the word "quit". Nor do they understand the concepts of choosing one’s battles, "the impossible dream", or a good night’s sleep.
I stand between our respective offices, watching Josh and Leo work the phones, neither man willing to concede. I lean against the doorframe and think back to the events of the past 24 hours. More than familial dysfunction and unsolvable problems, this year the ghost of 12/23 gave us the opportunity to find our way home. I watched Toby and his father leave together, the slender threads of a fragile peace pulled taut between them. The President’s seeking absolution for something that’s either an act of national self-defense or a mortal sin (another thing I’m not supposed to know). CJ and Danny, if not picking up exactly where they left off, are at least trying to get back on an even keel.
And then we have Leo and Josh. The surrogate father and the son of his heart, struggling to provide a small measure of peace, on the holiest of nights, in the most uncertain of times. "For we all seem to give our lives away. Searching for things that we think we must own. Until on this evening, when the year is leaving. We all try to find our way home."
Fin
Find Our Way Home
(Words and Music by Trans-Siberian Orchestra – from their recording "The Christmas Attic)
He believed in the things
That he always thought he knew
And had done all the things
That he always wanted to do
Collecting
Each thing reflecting his worth
Bur now he pondered
How he had wandered this earth
For we all seem to give our lives away
Searching for things that we think we must own
Until on this evening
When the year is leaving
We all try to find our way home.
He had time or at least then he
Always thought he did
And mistakes, well, he thought that time
Always would forgive
Each transgression
For his intention
Forgetting
Years he squandered
On things he now was regretting
For we all seem to give our lives away
Searching for things that we think we must own
Until on this evening
When the year is leaving
We all try to find our way home.
For we all seem to give our lives away
Searching for things that we think we must own
But on this evening
When the year is leaving
I think I would be all right
If on this Christmas night
I could just find my way home