No Room At The Inn

This story is for anyone who has ever attended an infant nativity play and cried silent tears - of laughter

Mums and dads, grannies and grandpas, aunties and uncles, neighbours and friends filled in the school hall for the Nativity Play, the highlight of the school year.  I was ill that year but went along to see them perform. I found a seat just as the lights dimmed and a spot light lit up the small stage.

        The curtain opened to reveal the outlines of various eastern-looking houses painted on a backdrop and two rather forlorn palm trees made out of papier mache and green crepe paper which drooped in the centre of the stage.

  

        The little boy playing the lead as Joseph entered wearing a brightly coloured towel over his head. He took centre stage without a trace of nerves, stared at the audience and then beckoned a particularly worried-looking Mary who entered, pulling her large card-board-and-polystyrene donkey.

     "Come on!" urged Joseph. "Hurry up!" He banged on the door of one of the houses. "Open up! Open up!!" he shouted loudly.

      

     The Innkeeper, with a face like a death mask, threw open the door, "What?" he barked.

     "Have you any rooms?"

     "No!"

     "You have!"

     "I haven't!"

     "You have, I saw t' light on!" (Dear Reader, this Joseph was played by a Yorkshire lad)

     "I haven't!"

     "Look, we've travelled all t'night, up and down those sand dunes, through dusty towns, over hills, in and out of rivers. We're flippin' fit t' drop."

     

     "Can't help that, there's no room," replied the Innkeeper.

     "An' I've got t'wife out here on t'donkey." Joseph gestured in the direction of a very glum-looking Mary who was staring at the audience, completely motionless.

    

     The innkeeper remained unmoved. "And you can't leave that donkey there. You'll have to move it!"

    "Well, give us a room."

    "There is no room in the inn. How many more times do I have to tell you?"

    "She's having a babby, tha knaws."

    "Well, I can't help that, tis nowt t'do with me."

    "I know," replied Joseph sighing as he turned to the audience, "An' it's nowt t' do with me neither."

  

   To the surprise of the  children there were great guffaws of laughter from the audience.

    

     And so the play progressed until the final magic moment. Little rosy-faced angels in white with cardboard wings and tinsel halos, shepherds with towels over their heads and cotton-wool beards, the Three Kings in coloured robes and shiny paper hats gathered around Mary and Joseph on the cramped stage to sing 'Away in a Manger' and bring a tear to every eye in the place.

The End