Christmas is a time of reflection. In my memories of childhood holidays, celebrations centered around family, hugs, amazing food, and the remembrance of Christ's birth in Bethlehem. There were holiday songs, black and white TV shows, making snowmen with my Grandpa and baking with my Grandma. There were candlelight services on Christmas Eve and caroling with the church choir for the elderly and shut ins. When it snowed, and it often did in the mountains of Southern Virginia, my Grandpa, or "Daddy" would bundle me up in my warmest snow suit, scarf, boots, mittens and hat, then put on his own winter gear and grab the sled. He would bundle me in blankets and grab the reigns of the little wooden sled with the shiny silver runners and off we would go, him pulling, singing and humming. He smiled often at me for singing along, even when I didn't know all the words. I remember the snowflakes falling under the street lights, softly landing on my mittens and my blanket. I remember my amazement of how beautiful, ornate and delicate they were.
When we returned home, there was warm cocoa with little tiny marshmallows to warm our tummies, and a roaring toasty fire in the fireplace to heat chilled noses and toeses! After a warm bath, clad in snuggly pajamas with feet, and hugging my favorite bear "Ted", Daddy would read me a story and sit by the fire with me as I watched the ever changing flames, listening to the pops of the sap pockets in the wood and being slowly mesmerized to sleep.On nights when I won the battle against sleep, after being carried upstairs and tucked in, we would say my prayers and I would quickly doze off into peaceful sleep. On nights where sleep came before I was aware, I would wake the next morning, snuggly warm and tucked in my bedcovers, Ted diligently protecting me as only he could.
Please don't misunderstand, I don't want to live in the past. As I look back on my snapshot moments of Christmases past, I wonder why the focus of Christmas seems to have faded, like old pictures, changed, and not in a good way. The picture is dull, the image is skewed and the focus is gone. Today, Christmas decorations and merchandise appear on store shelves before the ghosts and goblins of Halloween have had a chance to collect their treats of fall. There are far more Santa decorations than Nativity Scenes. People are obsessed with spending and buying the most expensive and prolific supply of gifts. - It's akin to a crime to buy a heartfelt gift if it doesn't have a huge pricetag associated with it. Parental guilt is heaped on like whipped cream on the chubby kid's sundae, if hundreds of dollars of gifts aren't piled under the tree on Christmas morning. I honestly cannot remember any ONE specific gift from any of my childhood Christmases, but I vividly remember the fun, happiness and family unity. I just wonder why the season of Christmas - the reason for the season is now centered on indulgence and spending, not on Christ, family, love, caring, peace and hope. We are more reachable and less in touch, more impersonally/electronically connected, and less involved. Family dinner has been replaced by food in a box or carryout. If "fixing it" takes more than the push of a key or swallowing a pill, we have a difficult time finding time to do it.
I love my iPhone, my Nook Color, my laptop, my netbook, my digital camera, my iPod. I have as many technological trappings as any modern girl. On the other side, I love my puppy dogs, snuggling in front of my fireplace with my husband, my fuzzy slippers, hot cocoa and a black and white movie. I love my few simple presents around the tree and watching my dogs tear open their packages on Christmas morning (or sooner if they can get close enough to their stockings before Christmas). I love walking in the snow, even if no one sings with me.
This year I look forward to cookies, family, cocoa and peaceful midnight Christmas services. I look forward to festivities, and to new memories, and maybe more than anything... I look forward to turning down the sound and slowing the pace, just a bit, just for a while, and making a new technicolor, focused digitally recorded new memory of my life today, just like how things used to be...
