Happy Christmas, one and all.
When I was young, my elder sister and I (and sometimes my
younger sister as well) would get up ridiculously early on Christmas morning:
often three or four a.m. We were
permitted to go through our stockings as soon as we got up, but had to wait for
our parents (and possibly until after breakfast was eaten and snow shoveled)
before opening the presents under the tree.
This situation suited us just fine. Our stockings always had something to
interest us, yes, but there was a more compelling draw: the gentle colored
lights of the Christmas tree against the silence and stillness of a cold winter’s
morning far before the sun.
I hardly remember anything I got in my stocking. A little money usually, I think: a quarter
or, in later years, a dollar. Perhaps
some candy and a fun small trinket that would amuse me until the parents
arose. Another thing I do not remember
is speaking much with my sisters. If my
memory is to be believed, we spent most of that very early morning sitting on
the floor with our stockings and gazing at the Christmas tree or the fireplace—which,
in my memory, is lit, improbable though that sounds. Perhaps some lingering embers from the night
before?
That, to me, is what Christmas is: those early hours of dark
and peace and contentment. Everything
after that—arguments, discussions, opening presents, and the endless drive to
see our relatives (made more endless by my habitual car sickness) were simply
the necessary titbits one had to put up with for the good parts.
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