Christmas Madness

Christmas Madness
It was a day before Christmas, a day with new airs, a cold breeze sheltered the feelings of those winters where hopes flowed like renewed cascades of faith. I awoke after a restful night's sleep, my brown eyes focused on the old clock that chimed relentlessly, letting me know that the morning had begun.

I woke up still a little sleepy, I decided to go into the bathroom and let the warm water finish bringing me back to my senses. I dressed quickly to calm the cold that ran through every nook and cranny of my room.

I went down to the kitchen to give calm to my stomach that was roaring, among so many things to satiate my voracious appetite, I looked for what I loved the most for so long, desperately I rummaged through the cupboard, but there was not a single coffee bean, my mood fell to the ground and I had only one option, to go out to a coffee shop near my apartment.

I put on a coat and a festive Christmas hat, a scarf decorated with green Christmas trees, wrapped around my neck. I opened the door and the cold hit my humanity head-on, I took courage moved by my taste for caffeine, and went out as fast as I could dodging the blizzard and the snowflakes that fell relentlessly.

On the street, I met people disgusted by the cold and the stress of Christmas shopping, it was as if the season of love and peace had turned into a war where time ran relentlessly, with the sole purpose of destroying a materialistic Christmas wrongly desired.

I was leaving behind that madness of incessant noise, insulting voices, and people running from one side to the other as if they were looking for something they thought they had lost. I arrived at the cafeteria and felt a relief in my soul, it seemed that the atmosphere of so much frustration and negativity was about to take me too.

I opened the door and the sound of the bells rang in my eardrums as if they were welcoming me to a new place. My eyes were stunned at what they saw, it seemed as if a hallucination had invaded my pupils, I ran my hands across my eyelids trying to find a conscious reality to which I was accustomed.

The people in that place had gone crazy or I had fallen into a delirium of some strange disease that blurs reality. I saw hugs that came and went, like the waves of the sea, loud laughter that filled the place with friendship and affection. I saw children playing as brothers and sisters, regardless of sex, race, or creed. I saw the rich sharing with the poor, money seemed not to define social status, only love and solidarity.

The music played and people sang in unison, the harmony filled the place with the warmth of cordiality, the cold outside had been extinguished, and now there were only people trapped in a bubble of peace and love. The coffee was still flowing through every mouth and it seemed to make the people who were in emotional ecstasy happier.

Someone grabbed my shoulder and offered me a delicious steaming cup of coffee, a smile was on his face and then he said. "It's on the house, Merry Christmas."

He walked away joining the social revelry, I walked over to a table and as I lifted my cup to bring it to my mouth, a skinny gangly man with a somewhat crazed countenance, spoke to me. "Why the look of disbelief."

"Sorry it's just that this looks like something out of a movie, today's world is not like that. Selfishness, mistrust, betrayal, envy, and hatred reign in these times, what is happening here is crazy." I dropped the coffee cup on the table as I fixed my gaze on the man.

"It's weird don't you think, when people start behaving with brotherhood, solidarity, and love, everything seems crazy. Cold materialism and selfishness, have taken over our consciences and we have forgotten our human roots, everything that makes us special. The routine of the self alone has poisoned hearts, making them contemptible and distrustful."

"But how did this happen?" I looked at the man expectantly for what he had to say.

"I just wanted to awaken those dormant feelings in every soul, I invented a social catalyst that makes people behave as they are. The serum was added to each coffee and given to people, this is the result. The liquid fused perfectly with the caffeine that goes straight to the mind. Now, do you want to stay 'normal' or soak in the 'craziness'?"

I looked down at my coffee and many truths seemed to flash before my eyes implicit in that dark, steaming liquid. I looked up again and the man was gone, as if he had vanished into that cordial air. Then I thought I heard. "Merry Christmas, haha!"

I grabbed the cup of coffee without a second thought, closed my eyes, and decided to go into that 'Christmas madness'. The delicious coffee ran through my whole body to every cell, I opened my eyes and was finally happy.