OPEN LETTERS

Dear people – particularly those in the northern hemisphere,

You know me by my chilly, intricate artwork. My palette might be your window or blades of grass and tulip faces may fascinate me for the night. I'm flexible.

Occasionally I stick around until just before the sun yawns itself awake so I can observe your reactions. Some of you are quite enthusiastic, thank you. "Ooh"s and "ahh"s are particularly sweet tokens of recognition. And yanking out your cellphones to capture my techniques boosts my ego.

Some of you are less appreciative. Just because you have to throw bed sheets over flower planters or scrape your damn windshields. First-world problems, people.

I create. I am beauty.

Did you whine at Botticelli's tempera and paintbrushes kicking about the pews of Prato Cathedral? Did you interrupt Carrington in the middle of dabbing at a provocative hyena and demand she tidy her oils? Probably. Even back then art was so unappreciated.

You humans are fickle. Edvard Munch had to croak before you placed any value on his work, after all. Well, that might be because he had most of them locked away. But I'm talking about me — and my artwork is 100% eco-friendly and right out there in the open for you to enjoy!

You should know better than to anger me. I can be destructive. Do you like a wee bit of OJ with your breakie? Then babble graciously about my incredibly powerful yet delicate efforts. Need I remind you of the winter of 1894–1895 when my wrath produced the Great Freeze? The entire orange crop went bye-bye along with 90% of Orange County's citrus trees. Yep, I can play nasty.

Mostly though I'm here to plead with you to quit calling me Jack.

I am vapor, wind, and temperature. I am a fractal process. When you examine geometric shapes or the Earth's atmosphere, do you observe any sort of penis or shrivelly testicles? You don't see vulva or a clitoris? Of course not!

I'm freaking invisible, folks. And yet you define me as cis-male and call me Jack.

Santa is another story. He has a penis. Sadly, he drank a little too much of that Stolichnaya at our Holiday Celebrities New Year's Eve bash last year and exposed himself. And, yes, the Leprechaun is a crossdresser — mainly because pants are more helpful for rainbow-climbing and pot-o-gold hiding.

But the rest of us celebratory goonies? I beg you to quit lumping us into some sort of label. The Tooth Fairy, Cupid, and I — much like The Holy Spirit — bear no genitalia.

Our gender doesn't affect how we do our work. Whether or not The Tooth Fairy has labium doesn't stop them from collecting those goo-covered bits of bicuspid. The existence, or not, of glans tucked into their toga-ish diaper doesn't change the fact that Cupid still has arrows to shoot and targets to hit.

We're getting overly exhausted about the fact that LGBTQ+ applies to everyone but us. And I'm specifically done with the name Jack. I prefer gender-neutral Jacky. With a Y.

So, please, give up assigning gender to us invisible holiday figures. And we will continue producing nature art, leaving money under pillows, and assisting you in your quest to fall passionately in lust.

Sincerely and Seriously,

Jacky

P.S. I realize, of course, that I'm being very North American-centric here. There are many other international personalities in our union but I'm not getting into their stories here and now.

©Jennifer J. McDougall 2021

Thanks for reading. Please check out my other Open Letters.