Now a good truckin’ song, a fair country song, and maybe one or two Christmas songs ought to have a long narrated story about crushed dreams melted away by a miracle of human spirit (cf. ‘It’s a Wonderful Life’ if it were a folk ballad).
So, you’d better sit down within the range of a box of tissues…
Dean Wilt gives it the old country try with “Santa and the Trucker.” After an NDE, a trucker experiences the love of Christmas with Santa’s magic. Bippety boppety boo. But–he owes the big man a favor…. (A better, albeit with more singing, version of the boy/daddy dilemma is by Red Simpson.)
In fact, let’s let Red Simspon preach his “The Old Christmas Truck” about a hobo trying to truck toys to the mountainous orphanage… does he die? Is he Jesus? Or–?
The king of kings of winter weepies has to be Red Sovine singing about that crippled kid trucker orphan “Teddy Bear” from 1970. This was a hit in its own way, revisited by Diana Williams six years later with “Teddy Bear’s Last Ride” revealing Mama’s side of the story after… after… gulp –What! the Kleenex is all gone? Cruel, cruel Christmas carol!