Ian decided to ski this time, rather than snow board. He had
been doing both for years and liked to change once in a while.
Elise was a skier today too and so they rode up the lift together,
quite a bit. They talked about everything, mostly about the class, but also about their jobs, their lives, their friends, other students, and their futures.
Elise would graduate before Ian and she thought that she
probably would return to Mrs. Claus' operations, but she really
wasn't sure. Once you get into management at the North Pole, you can go just about anywhere, sometimes even to other parts of the world, when needed, to work with Santa's Helpers.
Besides being trained in the culinary arts as a chef, Elise had
also been trained as an Emergency Medical Technician. Some
people call them paramedics, others call them medics. But,
basically she was trained to respond to elves requiring first aid
because of work related injuries or to help them in the early stages of a common cold. Even Santa had been known to catch the sniffles once in awhile! And, as everyone knows, if you can help somebody early, usually a cold won't be as bad and won't last as long.
Ian thought that he would probably return to the shipping
operations until he received a management assignment. He
thought he would be interested in being one of Santa's helpers on Christmas Eve, but knew that there was a lot of competition for these prestigious assignments. And he knew that to even be a
candidate, you had to graduate in the top two percent of the CSS classes for the entire year. This was a major hurdle!
When everybody had had enough skiing and boarding, they met
in the lodge for some of their favorite beverage - hot apple cider - before dinner. It was nice to relax after a hard day on the slopes.
Everybody was busy chatting, and some were even doing a little
flirting! Life was great! Teacher Marie looked around the room
approvingly. "This has got to be the best group I've ever had
together at one time!" she thought.
After awhile, dinner was served and it was delicious! Then
came some music and some of their favorite elf songs. They all
joined in with lots of energy, some of them as if they were opera
singers! And of course, there was a lot of laughing and joking.
Then the music slowed down and became soft and the lights were turned down a bit. Some of the elves started to dance.
"Ian, aren't you going to ask me to dance?" Elise whispered.
"Uh, yes, I was, like, uh," Ian stuttered. ("Arghh, I hate it
when I talk this way," Ian said to himself. Calm down boy!")
"Would you like to dance, Elise?" Ian asked, this time with
more confidence.
"1’d love to," she whispered and they soon found themselves
out on the dance floor with the others. They danced as if they had been partners for a long, long time. This was a night to remember.
