Merry Christmas - December 19, 2013

As published in the White River Current - Thursday December 19, 2013

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas, everywhere you go.  Tis the season to be jolly.  This is the favorite time of the year for most people.  Time for parties, decorating, buying gifts, always keeping in mind the true reason for the season.  It’s a time for families and friends to get together in a true spirit of fellowship and love.  The word, merry, actually means “festive” so enjoy, have a good time, be generous in your giving and be thankful for the greatest gift of all, the gift of the Christ child.  When I was a boy growing up in the Rock House on Red Lane, we always put up a tree, a cedar that came from out in the pasture.  We decorated with the tinsel and ornaments saved from the previous year.  My job was to drape the icicles over the branches.  This was a time consuming job and I took it very seriously, trying not to break any of those fragile, silver strands.  I wonder if they still make those things.  Probably not with the brilliantly lighted, artificial trees that are now available.  Our church always had special children’s programs and a party that was held in the American Legion building.  This was mainly for convenience because the pews took up most of the space in the one-room church.  Anyway, we played games, dunked for apples, laughed and ate cookies and ended our celebration with someone reading the Christmas story from the gospel of Luke and singing “Silent Night.”  It was great fun.  My mother always prepared a special meal for Christmas dinner.  It usually consisted of chicken and dressing with the usual trimmings.  She also made popcorn balls, fudge and divinity candy and other treats for us kids.  I don’t ever remember my mother cooking a turkey at either Thanksgiving or Christmas.  We always opened gifts on Christmas eve and went to bed early, hoping that old St. Nick might stop by the house and leave another present or two while we were asleep.  He did pretty regularly for several years but as I got older, he failed to stop by, probably because I had been naughty and not nice.  Those were great memories.  I particularly enjoy the music of the Christmas season.  Until a few years ago, singers from the local churches joined together to rehearse and present a community Christmas cantata for the enjoyment of a standing room only congregation.  Donnie Speak and I would joke that we had to go by the hospital  before rehearsal and get a hormone shot so we could hit the high tenor notes.  We stopped having the community cantata when some of the churches decided they preferred doing their own thing.  I have heard several requests to revive the community tradition next year.  Hope it works out.  You may remember several months back that I had decided to write a Christmas song and cash in on all the royalties it would produce every year.  I still intend to do this, and also write a novel, but I have been so tied up in other activities that I haven’t been able to do much composing.  What is that saying about a certain road being paved with good intentions?  I still get goose bumps every year when I hear a reading of the Christmas story from the second chapter of Luke, King James version preferred:  “And so it was, that, while they were there…she brought forth her firstborn son, and wrapped him in swaddling clothes, and laid him in a manger…And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.”  Except for one brief passage, the Bible is silent about the boyhood experiences of Jesus.  I wonder, did he have friends to help celebrate his birthday every year.  I think so.  And I can just hear his dad say something like this:  “Jesus, your birthday is coming up next week and I have decided to rename the business from Nazareth Carpentry Shop to Joseph and Son Carpentry.  You have learned the business well and someday, of course, it will all be yours.  Don’t forget our motto ‘measure twice, saw once’ and always remember that ‘the customer is always right.’”  Probably never happened but I expect that Joseph was one proud father.  Merry Christmas, everyone, and I’ll see you next year with some more stories from the past.  Bye for now.