My Son and Rudolf, A Couple of Misfits

One of my favorite Christmas television specials when I was a kid was Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer.  It was on again last night and it was the first time I watched it with my son.

Kai liked the songs and laughed at some of the funnier scenes like when the Abominable Snowmonster sinks into the water, but he wasn’t as fully engaged in it as I thought he would be.  Most of the time, he was playing with his Lego Advent Calendar while only halfway watching the show.  I think he may still be too young to really understand the story.

For me, though, seeing it again with Kai helped me appreciate its message even more.  Rudolf, of course, is the reindeer born with a shiny red nose.  He is ridiculed by the other young reindeer and feels outcast for being different.  He meets up with a fellow misfit, an elf named Hermey, who is outcast because he wants to become a dentist instead of making toys.  They sing “We’re a Couple of Misfits” and decide to run away and be “independent together.”  In the end, they return home and, the very thing that made Rudolf feel like a misfit, his glowing nose, helps make him the hero who saves Christmas.

I don’t know if Kai feels like a misfit these days, although I’m pretty sure that he did when he was going to our neighborhood school.  And whether he feels it or not, I often feel it for him.  He doesn’t have a shiny red nose; in fact, sometimes he seems like all the other reindeer kids.  But, sooner or later he will do something that shows he is different.  Those who don’t know any better may see him as a misfit.

I hope that my son will be accepted as Rudolf and Hermey eventually were.  And perhaps, one day, his special talents will help make him a hero, too.

“There’s always tomorrow

For dreams to come true

Believe in your dreams

Come what may.

“There’s always tomorrow

For dreams to come true

Tomorrow is not far away.”

– Clarice the reindeer