I see nothing wrong with how other people celebrate, but, at the same time, I tend to concentrate on that concept as well. But to me . . . what does it mean to me? Is it just about the baby Jesus stuff? Santa? Walmart? Pie?
So kind of in a private way, I went looking for my own reasons for celebrating, for understanding what this holiday, with all of its mess and craziness and lovely moments and expectations, means to me. I think I found the answer.
I found part of it in a discussion a woman was having with some people about why she does so much baking during the holidays. Normally, she isn't one to make candy or pies or cakes . . . but her mother was, so was her grandmother, and her aunts. When she was a kid, these women would bring these things to Christmas celebrations. Quite often, she would find herself in the kitchen watching as they cooked them, sometimes even helping. These women are all gone now and have been for years. But when she cooks at Christmas, these women are right there with her.
This led me to making a decision about what my Christmas dinner would be. My roommate and I decided to fix something nontraditional that our mothers and grandmothers loved to eat. It's a simple meal, a poor people meal, really, but something they made often. When I ate it today, I thought about all those meals I had with these women.
I found part of it today as well. A woman that I know miscarried a baby three years ago. She was late in the pregnancy and knew it was going to be a girl. Now every year at Christmas, she goes and buys everything she would have given to her daughter . . . all the toys, all the cute little clothes, all the small surprises . . . and gives them to a needy family with a daughter.
I also found my answer in decorating the tree with my best friend, in watching holiday specials with my roommate, in sending and receiving cards, in singing Weezer songs at the top of my lungs with my brother as we drove home from my grandfather's house.
To me, the true meaning of Christmas is that it's a time when we focus enough on the moment that we truly make fundamental and valid memories. Most of the time, we just stumble along and don't pay that much attention to what's going on. We make some impressions of our lives, but not that many.
However, because we designate holidays as times with special meaning, we actually pay more attention to what is going on. So, in essence, we're really living. Not just getting more physical stuff to add to the pile of our other stuff, but gaining tangible, meaningful impressions of this experience we're actually having.
We celebrate our dead. We miss them. We go through rituals. We make contact with others, offering them cheer and goodwill. We give to others. We have meals with them. We sing. We revel. We truly, truly live.
So really, as to my understanding of what a deity would be, this is a truly holy time of year. We're living. We're living with meaning. We're making our own impressions of things and giving other people impressions and memories of us. Tis the season of making contact. Tis the season of reaching out, reaching to, and reaching beyond.
And if you're one of the faithful out there, I don't think you can be offended by my theories here. You believe God created part of himself as a human and sent it to live a human life. That's what I view as the true meaning of this season.
It's the celebration of connecting with the fact that you're alive and human.
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