It was quite a popular decision, but Barb Wiggin looked at Owen as if she were revising her opinion of how “cute” he was, and the rector observed Owen with a detachment that was wholly out of character for an ex-pilot. The Rev. Mr. Wiggin, such a veteran of Christmas pageants, looked at Owen Meany with profound respect—as if he’d seen the Christ Child come and go, but never before had he encountered a little Lord Jesus who was so perfect for the part.
It was only our second rehearsal of the Christmas Pageant when Owen decided that the crib, in which he could fit—but tightly—was unnecessary and even incorrect. Dudley Wiggin based his entire view of the behavior of the Christ Child on the Christmas carol “Away in a Manger,” of which there are only two verses.
It was this carol that convinced the Rev. Mr. Wiggin that the Baby Jesus mustn’t cry.
The cat-tle are low-ing, the ba-by a-wakes,
But lit-tle Lord Je-sus, no cry-ing he makes.
If Mr. Wiggin put such stock in the second verse of “Away in a Manger,” Owen argued that we should also be instructed by the very first verse.
A-way in a man-ger, no crib for his bed,
The lit-tle Lord Je-sus laid down his sweet head.
“IF IT SAYS THERE WAS NO CRIB, WHY DO WE HAVE A CRIB?” Owen asked. Clearly, he found the crib restraining. “‘THE STARS IN THE SKY LOOKED DOWN WHERE HE LAY, THE LIT-TLE LORD JE-SUS, A-SLEEP ON THE HAY,’” Owen sang.
Thus did Owen get his way, again; “on the hay” was where he would lie, and he proceeded to arrange all the hay within the crèche in such a fashion that his comfort would be assured, and he would be sufficiently elevated and tilted toward the audience—so that no one could possibly miss seeing him.
“THERE’S ANOTHER THING,” Owen advised us. “YOU NOTICE HOW THE SONG SAYS, ‘THE CATTLE ARE LOWING’? WELL, IT’S A GOOD THING WE’VE GOT COWS. THE TURTLEDOVES COULDN’T DO MUCH ‘LOWING.’”
If cows were what we had, they were the sort of cows that required as much imagination to identify as the former turtledoves had required. Mary Beth Baird’s cow costumes may have been inspired by Mary Beth’s elevated status to the role of the Virgin Mary, but the Holy Mother had not offered divine assistance, or even divine workmanship, toward the making of the costumes themselves. Mary Beth appeared to have been confused mightily by all the images of Christmas; her cows had not only horns but antlers—veritable racks, more suitable to reindeer, which Mary Beth may have been thinking of. Worse, the antlers were soft; that is, they were constructed of a floppy material, and therefore these astonishing “horns” were always collapsing upon the faces of the cows themselves—obliterating entirely their already impaired vision, and causing more than usual confusion in the crèche: cows stepping on each other, cows colliding with donkeys, cows knocking down kings and shepherds.
“The cows, if that’s what they are,” Barb Wiggin observed, “should maintain their positions and not move around—not at all. We wouldn’t want them to trample the Baby Jesus, would we?” A deeply crazed glint in Barb Wiggin’s eye made it appear that she thought trampling the Baby Jesus would register in the neighborhood of a divine occurrence, but Owen, who was always anxious about being stepped on—and excessively so, now that he was prone and helpless on the hay—echoed Barb Wiggin’s concern for the cows.
“YOU COWS, JUST REMEMBER. YOU’RE SUPPOSED TO BE ‘LOWING,’ NOT MILLING AROUND.”
“I don’t want the cows ‘lowing’ or milling around,” Barb Wiggin said. “I want to be able to hear the singing, and the reading from the Bible. I want no ‘lowing.’”
“LAST YEAR, YOU HAD THE TURTLEDOVES COOING,” Owen reminded her.
“Clearly, this isn’t last year,” Barb Wiggin said.
“Now now,” the rector said.
“THE SONG SAYS ‘THE CATTLE ARE LOWING,’” Owen said.
“I suppose you want the donkeys hee-hawing!” Barb Wiggin shouted.
“THE SONG SAYS NOTHING ABOUT DONKEYS,” Owen said.
“Perhaps we’re being too literal about this song,” Mr. Wiggin interjected, but I knew there was no such thing as “too literal” for Owen Meany, who grasped orthodoxy from wherever it could be found.
Yet Owen relented on the issue of whether or not the cattle should “low”; he saw there was more to be gained in rearranging the order of music, which he had always found improper. It made no sense, he claimed, to begin with “We Three Kings of Orient Are” while we watched the Annou
ncing Angel descend in the “pillar of light”; those were shepherds to whom the angel appeared, not kings. Better to begin with “O Little Town of Bethlehem” while the angel made good his descent; the angel’s announcement would be perfectly balanced if delivered between verses two and three. Then, as the “pillar of light” leaves the angel—or, rather, as the quickly ascending angel departs the “pillar of light”—we see the kings. Suddenly, they have joined the astonished shepherds. Now hit “We Three Kings,” and hit it hard!
Harold Crosby, who had not yet attempted a first flight in the apparatus that enhanced his credibility as an angel, wanted to know where “Ory and R” were.
No one understood his question.
“‘We Three Kings of Ory and R,’” Harold said. “Where are ‘Ory’ and ‘R’?”
“‘WE THREE KINGS OF ORIENT ARE,’” Owen corrected him. “DON’T YOU READ?”
All Harold Crosby knew was that he did not fly; he would ask any question, create any distraction, procrastinate by any means he could imagine, if he could delay being launched by Barb Wiggin.
I—Joseph—had nothing to do, nothing to say, nothing to learn. Mary Beth Baird suggested that, as a helpful husband, I take turns with her in handling Owen Meany—if not exactly lifting him out of the hay, because Barb Wiggin was violently opposed to this, then at least, Mary Beth implied, we could fondle Owen, or tickle him, or pat him on the head.