Yes, I'm still on break and therefore doing one more encore entry before switching to new stuff for 2009. So ignore it if you want, or read it again, your choice, but here's my after-Christmas entry from last year with just a few changes:
Hear the silence? That's the sound of After-the-Holidays: Absence of car horns and traffic jams. Company now gone. The blessedly inactive calculator. Children soon to be back in school. The end of squawking, dancing Santas at the mall and frantic shoppers vying for position.
Unfortunately, it's also the sound of missing Christmas carols, gone from the airwaves until next year. Silenced silver bells. Fading echoes of church cantatas and carillons and singing children. Sighs and lingering good-byes of loved ones leaving.
It's over, and life is ... back to normal again. And even though we don't miss the squeezed budgets, the crass commercialism, the desperate retailers hawking their wares, the late nights, the frenzied trips and wearing fatigue, and the noise that seems inescapable--isn't there, deep within, a small part us that feels an emptiness, a yearning for the colors, the music, the smiles of strangers, the good will that somehow thaws the coldest of hearts for a season?
Don't we miss the meaning and the magic of those winter weeks that make the ordinary things shine and set the common things aglow? Don't we, every now and then, at least in secret, wish we had it back so we could capture the best of it to take out and look at when we need to touch the wonder one more time? We'd treasure it more, be more sensitive to its beauty, more reverent in its holiness, more thankful for its gifts--the ones without a price tag.
Next year, we tell ourselves. Next year will be different. We won't rush as much, buy as much, bake as much, eat as much, fret as much. We'll do less and enjoy it more, bask in the priceless things and cherish each passing moment. We'll live the season so thoughtfully, so gratefully, so generously, there will be no feelings of lament, no memories to regret, no sadness when it passes ... only a fullness of joy and a smile of remembrance.
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Can you tell I was feeling nostalgic when I wrote that one? Well, "next year" is here, and just as I was last year about this time, I'm already missing the season--at least my favorite parts of it.
We haven't "undecorated" yet--I delay this as long as decently possible and as long as I can before the neighbors start shaking their heads as they pass by. Radio stations have already pulled the plug on their Christmas music (and while I'll admit I won't miss hearing "Grandma Got Run Over By a Reindeer" a dozen times a day, I'm grateful for all our Christmas CDs so I can keep the sounds of the season going as long as I like). Most of the lights on my street have been taken down and packed away. And the "Christmas spirit" that seems to shed more kindness, more thoughtfulness, more "peace and goodwill" among us every year is slowly but surely drifting out with the fog.
Now we're left with tacky "year-in-review" shows and gaudy after-Christmas ads. Some are no doubt relieved that the house is quieter and neater (a little too quiet and neat to suit me), and everyone talks about getting "back to normal" again. Whatever that is. I'm not so sure "normal" is my favorite part of life.
Did you have a white Christmas? We didn't, but I'm hoping it will come any day now, to help me prolong the season and my favorite things ... things such as hot chocolate, lights reflecting on the snow, carols and church bells, rowdy grandsons blowing the electric train whistle, "The Sound of Music" and "It's a Wonderful Life," leftover candy and cookies, a blanket of laughter and love mingling with peace and nostalgia, and ... well, you know.
I can almost see the eyes of some of my friends rolling heavenward about now. "There she goes again ... why doesn't she just turn over her calendar and face reality?"
Well ... the reality is that I have always loved Christmas. Even those Christmases that were bittersweet or sad for one reason or another. I think it's because the season is that one time of the year that allows us to become children again, to see the world through the unjaded eyes of the young, to make wishes and believe they just might come true, and to know the wonder of days and nights bathed in beauty and light and hope.
So even though I've put the gifts away, transferred the calendar, stuffed the freezer with leftover goodies, and made out a brand new To-Be-Done list, I'm going to hold onto Christmas-past just a little longer before allowing "normal" to descend.
For now ... and for 2009, may God rest ye and bless ye!
BJ
