Christmas is one month from today!
I always look forward to the Christmas season with a mix of excitement and dread. Dread because with 1) the Thanksgiving service to plan, 2) the Christmas Eve service to plan, 3) the Advent readers to schedule (for both services), 4) the church Christmas decorations to plan, 5) my OWN decorations, 6) my choir concert to prepare for, 7) added Saturday rehearsals for my concert, 8) costumes fittings (two so far) for the next opera, 9) parties, 10) tons of baking, 11) a three-day trip to Vegas, 12) Christmas shopping, wrapping, and cards, 13) all my department's decorations to plan (and we would have to pick a "Nightmare Before Christmas" theme - sheesh!), and...what am I forgetting?...oh, that's right!... 14) I'm redecorating my bathroom and kitchen!
What was I thinking?
Truthfully, this is the same schedule I have every year. It just looks humbling when written out like that, doesn't it? I don't know what possessed me to redecorate precisely at this time of year, although my sister did say that new kitchen and bathroom colors gave her some good gift ideas. Always willing to please, that's me.
I look at my calendar and almost every single evening and weekend, starting from about a week ago, is full. I've become proficient at managing my time, but still, every year I say I'm going to cut back.
But then, every year I wonder...what to cut out?
Dropping out of choir or the opera doesn't seem like much fun. After all, those are really the things that keep me sane. Rehearsing, performing, and spending time with my church and opera friends never fails to calm me down and cheer me up.
I don't want to cut any of the Christmas life out of my own home and personal life, either; no decorations? No tree? No boat parade? No cocoa in a paper cup that keeps slipping through your wooly-mittened hands as you wander the streets admiring Christmas lights in the festive parts of town? It's worth it to stay up until the wee small hours decorating the tree, if you ask me. Not to mention the joy Cosette gets out of eating plastic gumballs and pine needles.
Not go to parties that my closest friends throw? Not bake, when already I've had requests for mince pies, bourbon balls, candied nuts and macaroons? If you can't take time to enjoy the holiday with your friends, you're far too busy, indeed.
Half of the things on my list are church related. But how could I cut church out of Christmas?
Maybe I'll give up the Thanksgiving service and the Advent readers, but for the past 10 years or so one of my favorite parts of the season is getting up early on Christmas Eve day and going to the church to decorate for that night's service. It's cool and quiet and very, very still. I line all the wooden ledges with candles, check the Advent wreath, put up the Christmas Eve banners, and decorate the narthex with a truly beautiful wooden nativity scene. I put holly and ivy on the altar, and water all the poinsettias and pine and rosemary plants. I put boxes of candles by the doors; they get handed to people as they come in, and are lit during "Silent Night." Finally, I drag out the metal, sparkly luminaries and put fresh tea lights in them. I'm covered in glitter by the time I'm done. I set them by the door, and know that in another 12 hours I'll be back and I'll set them outside, and they'll light the way into the Christmas Eve service for my friends and church family members.
That's what Christmas is all about, Charlie Brown.
Well, it's settled then. Next year...I don't volunteer to all the office decorating!
And most definitely, no remodeling!
You have the Christmas spirit! It's all about enjoying the things and people you love. Too many people get wrapped up (no pun intended) in the material stuff. It's great to give and receive gifts, but sad when that's all the season means.
I wonder if the gradual lengthening of the shopping season has something to do with it. If Christmas started after Thanksgiving and ended in late December, it would only be a month long. But as it is now, it starts in August!
I do enjoy looking at Christmas lights and hanging out with you, though. That IS what Xmas is all about.
Posted by: Ron Rapp at November 26, 2003 06:01 PM