“What’s to-day, my fine fellow?” Ebenezer Scrooge called out to a young boy on the street at the end of Charles Dickens’ “A Christmas Carol.”
The day was Christmas, the boy responded — a holiday that Scrooge had learned to embrace after three ghosts visited him the night before to inspire a positive shift in his miserable, frugal and Grinch-esque outlook on life. With fears for the uncertain future and a growing distance from our childhood holiday memories, we searched for locations across the District where we might conjure the ghosts of Christmas past, present and future to recreate Scrooge’s beloved story arc.
Christmas Past: Discos and Spiro Agnew at Tudor Place
Jackson Lanzer | Staff Writer
Tudor Place, an old-timey home founded in 1805 by the granddaughter of Martha Washington and step-granddaughter of George Washington, seemed like the spot to encounter the spirit of Christmas past, a nearby glimpse into the 19th century of Charles Dickens. No one has lived in the house for half a century, leaving anyone who walks through as lonely as Scrooge was when the Ghost of Christmas Past forced him to rewatch his engagement falling apart.
I braved the cold last Friday to trek out to the house and take a tour. But the Christmas past I encountered was a bit more recent: The tour was 1970s disco-inspired, with disco balls, spangled pillows and vinyl records sprinkled throughout the estate.
The tour guide led me to a room with a family tree of the past owners of Tudor Place, including the final mansion owner’s favorite record: a collection of speeches by Spiro Agnew, Richard Nixon’s vice president, prominently displayed on a table. The Ghost of Christmas Past reminded Scrooge about how kind his mentor was, so perhaps it was fitting to see a tribute to someone whose boss kept them on for years despite allegations of corruption.
We entered a side room decorated with a Christmas tree and several ornaments still sitting in their packaging, including a packet of tinsel made out of lead, with the packaging preventing the lax safety standards from the past from causing us a future hospital visit. Of course, I asked the guide about spirits in the house. She said she had once heard the radiator — which had been unused for many years — clicking during a tour and suspected a ghost caused the disturbance. I unfortunately encountered no spirits, other than a glimpse of the Spiro of Christmas past. Based on the disco theme, I wouldn’t be surprised if the spirit of Spiro wore bell-bottom jeans.
Christmas Present: Trapped at Pentagon City
Nick Perkins | Culture Editor
In “A Christmas Carol,” the ghost of Christmas Present whisks Scrooge off to see how people in his life are celebrating Christmas Eve — often, it turns out, by mocking Scrooge. Wanting to get my own mini-tour of how people observe the holidays weeks in advance, be it through shopping or Christmas feasts at a food court, I decided to go to the Pentagon City mall. Plus, I couldn’t think of anything more “Christmas Present” than embracing capitalism to shop for Christmas presents.
Seven cops stood directly in front of the Metro gates and another eight surrounded the entrance to Pentagon City. I was a bit worried that I’d wandered into a situation akin to M. Night Shyamalan’s “Trap,” where the whole mall was just a lure to find one Scrooge-turned-serial killer, but I powered on nonetheless.
Pentagon City is a massive, all-white, semi-brutalist construction with four floors stuffed with brand-name outlets and, on this fine December Friday evening, holiday shoppers and high schoolers who don’t yet know how to drive. A massive Christmas tree sat in the center of the room in front of an even larger American flag hanging from the ceiling. People exclusively eating McDonald’s or Panda Express at lusterless tables filled the entire first-floor food court — there were no vacant seats in the poor chimney corner or crutches without owners.
Upstairs, a group of teenage boys crowded outside an Italian lingerie store and shared snickers as they glanced in. Next to them were four massage chairs, but they were all being used by children. With my back aching from too many days hunched over my standing desk, I let out a resentful “Bah humbug” in their direction.
I continued to wander through J. Crew outlets and shops selling “Let’s Go Brandon” bucket hats until I saw a sign I figured was certain to lead to Christmas cheer: “Come meet Santa Claus this way.” But when I followed the arrows to a small outpost in the corner, with a snowy backdrop and sign promising I could get my photo taken with Santa, all that was there at 6:24 p.m. on a Friday was a notice that if I went upstairs another floor, I could do more Christmas shopping. If that’s not Christmas Present, I don’t know what is.
Christmas Yet to Come: A failed trip to Zoo Lights
Grace Chinowsky | Editor in Chief
In Dickens’ tale, the spookiest and most consequential spirit in spurring Scrooge’s transformation is the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come. Marking the finale of the three supernatural encounters, the cloaked figure shows Scrooge a vision of a future Christmas in which he is dead, and, lacking companions due to his unkind demeanor, has nobody to mourn his passing.
To track down this revelatory ghost, I felt I needed to trek to a location that inspired self-reflection. ZooLights, the annual light show at the National Zoo in Woodley Park, seemed like the ideal spot to stroll and existentially contemplate my future.
But the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come never deals in certainties. If the spirit had shown Scrooge a vision he could predict or plan — instead of presenting the jarring prospect of his own demise — the old man never would’ve embraced a more generous perspective on Christmas. So it was fitting that my journey to the zoo went nothing as planned.
The twists in prophecy began before I even arrived, as myself and my travel sidekick, engrossed in discussion about our futures post-graduation, got on the wrong direction of the Metro. Once we had corrected our route, the throngs of people walking toward the zoo assured us that we had approached our destination. The entry point was illuminated with a multicolored gleam, including trees wrapped in string lights and luminous three-dimensional displays of animals.
Having arrived successfully, we were confident that the rest of our journey was set in stone — only to see a “PASSES SOLD OUT” sign at the zoo entry point moments later.
We got back on the Metro, dejected that we hadn’t seen any lights, until a pungent smell of tobacco wafted over from the seat next to us. A man in a hood eerily similar to the one donned by the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come had lit a cigarette. All we could see as he hunched over in his seat was the single flame from his lighter.
Before we were able to catch a glance of the mysterious figure, we got off the train. It felt as if the unpredictable progression of our night had underscored the fickleness of our future more than any programmed LED light show could provoke.
