Christmas · A guest · Warm · about a minute
Christmas Party Toast From a Neighbor (Warm, About 1 Minute)
A neighbor at a yearly Christmas party for the whole street wanted to thank the hosts, who have run it for years, in front of the old-timers and the families who just moved in.
Given by Hesper, a neighbor from number 22. 141 words. The names are made up.
The toast
Hi, everybody. I'm Hesper, from number 22, the green door. I'd like to say something about our hosts before the music goes back up.
Every year, Ludmila and Rolf stand at their front door with a roll of name tags and a marker. They write your first name, and under it, your house number. The first year we lived here, mine said "Hesper, 22." By the end of that night I'd learned that the man I'd been waving at for four months was "Bertil, 17," and that he fixes half the bikes on this street for free.
That's what this party is. It's the one night a year the whole street learns each other's names.
So thank you both, for the tags, and the marker, and for doing this every December. Everybody, raise a glass. To Ludmila and Rolf, number 9.
Why it works: The name tags are something every guest is wearing, so the whole room is in the story. One small payoff, finally learning the name of the man she'd been waving at, shows what the party does better than any compliment, and the last line uses the hosts' own trick on them.
Make it yours
Borrow the shape, not the lines. Put your own people, your own year and your own detail in each spot, or answer a few questions and get a first draft built from them.