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| It's Christmas Day... |
| 2002-12-25 |
| It snowed last night and this morning, giving us a white Christmas. That's an unusual event for Maryland — I think this is the first time in about 15 years. It was a wet snow, with big, fat flakes, the temperature just above freezing. It made everything pretty and white, and had the courtesy to melt on the roads so hardly anyone played bumper cars. Our gifts are all opened now, treasures that were tucked under the tree, waiting patiently, most of them, for a couple weeks for someone to take possession. As usual, I put off my shopping until yesterday. I've grown rather portly, spending as much time in front of the computer as I do, and I've grown a beard, which came in more white than gray. I wore a red shirt and my Santa Claus hat. I brought my favorite pipe, and the entire get-up made me look much more like Santa than like Foster Brooks. The malls were still pretty crowded, and a significant percentage of the crowds were children, shopping with their parents. I got many stares from the under-8 set, and when I saw them, I waved and said "hello!" Most of them responded, and a few even greeted me as Santa Claus. That's the age that still believes. When they go back to school, and the older kids tell them there is no Santa Claus, they can say, "Yes, there is! I saw him at the mall and he waved to me and I said 'hi'!" Or so I like to think. Curiously, I got far fewer stares and disappointingly few greetings, at Wal-Mart than I did at Macy's, Penney's, and the other more expensive stores. Is belief, even for very small children, an upscale thing? I hope not. When I was a child, our family was very poor, but still we believed in Santa Claus. I suspect that today it's not "kewl" for some people to tell their kids about the jolly old elf. It's soon enough we lose our capacity for overt belief. But I think that it's pretty essential that before that time comes we have the certitude that Santa Claus will bring us nice things at Christmas because he cares whether we've been good little boys and girls, just like Mom and Dad do. If Santa Claus — a complete stranger, who lives at the north pole and hangs around with elves — cares that much about us, maybe we should care about each other just as much? That caring is what gives rise to the "spirit of Christmas," the "most wonderful time of the year." I've read in the past few days that the forms of Christmas have spread to China and India and even Israel, where the rabbis warned that its observance would destroy people's Jewish identity. The Pope and, of course, all the usual suspects, have decried Christmas' crass commercialism and advocate a return to a more pristine form of observance. The Chinese and the Indians are the ones who have the right idea. Christmas, contrary to what the ACLU, the rabbis, or the Pope, or even the Enemy, would like to think, has slipped the leash. It's no longer a strictly religious occasion. It's an idea that stands on its own, born of Christianity, but now independent of it. Buddhists and Hindus and Taoists and agnostics and atheists and even observant Jews can play, too. It's the time of year when we consciously love our fellow men, starting with family and friends, but expanding that circle to all those around us. It's not a gooey, Kumbaya-based thing, half ideology and half hippy smarm. It's a compound of pleasure that we all made it through the current year, with the buildup of optimism that the coming year will be better, and it's an occasion to appreciate each other for what we are: Moms, Dads, kids, grandparents, friends, neighbors, acquaintances, and most of us perfectly nice people. |
| Posted by:Fred Pruitt |
| #1 Gawd bless us, every one! "Tiny Tim" have a good one everyone, we've been chilling out in front of the Telly watching DVDs and Discovery... |
| Posted by: Tony 2002-12-25 17:01:39 |