The sound of a child screaming is designed to elicit a reaction from you. That’s the evolutionary purpose of it. Crying, after all, is meant to annoy someone so severely that said person can’t help but try to make the kid better.

It makes me sad to think that I’ve personally undone millions of year of genetic advancement. It just doesn’t affect me any more, which makes me more than a little concerned for my potential future children.

I don’t mean to give you the wrong impression, though, I’m not out torturing kids. Not intentionally, I mean.

I’m Santa’s Elf.

Well, obviously not really, since that would just be ridiculous. Not that the costume they make me wear isn’t ridiculous.

I work at the Enchanted Forest, the seasonal employee’s ninth circle of hell.

I get to spend my holiday dodging the wandering hands of a half-drunken department store Santa in the basement of the downtown Goldsmiths surrounded by fake pine trees that look like they’re covered in shredded jicama and animatronic puppets that appear to have fallen out of my nightmares.

It’s enough to make a girl pine for a Memphis summer, and I don’t even have air conditioning.

Memphis Note
The Enchanted Forest has been a Christmas legend in Memphis for over half a century. It’s a whole series of rooms filled with Christmas trees and animatronic things leading to the man himself, Santa Claus. It was originally at the Gayoso Hotel, then the Goldsmith’s department store where it achieved it’s local fame. With Goldsmith’s now defunct, you can find the Enchanted Forest every Christmas at the Pink Palace Museum.