Christmas. It’s self-explanatory. It is the mass of Christ. Or put more simply, the celebration of the birth of Christ. That part doesn’t change. Our family traditions of Christmas often do. Many bake cookies, go caroling, throw parties, and make their yards look like a landing site for alien spacecraft. While all are similar, we put our own twists on each. That’s the beauty of being human: it is herd behavior individualized.
Decorations in the Maine household were always traditional and minimal compared to some of today’s expressions. We never had outdoor lights. Then outdoor lights were rare, not as sophisticated and nowhere near as varied as today’s. Inside there was the tree often cut down by my father while hunting stills in the woods. He was a multi-tasker before it became a buzzword. We always had big colored lights. Some of them were interesting shapes. My favorites were the big round ones that looked like they were covered with large sugar crystals. They always looked good enough to eat. There’s nothing like taking a bite out of a 120 volt sugar plum to brighten your celebration.
The decorations were collected by my parents over many years of marriage. Some were bought shortly after WWII when such “luxuries” became available again and, yes, Kate and I still hang the ones that have survived. Nothing makes a tree so beautiful as sweet memories hanging from its branches.
We also had the occasional snowman. I actually had a snowman candle on my dresser every year. I had it for years. It was never lit. In fact, I think it made an appearance in my children’s rooms until it finally had to be discarded. When you’re a wax snowman who spends the off season in the attic, you tend to melt, it’s what you do. There were also angels…plenty of angels. That didn’t count me and my brother. We were never much for angelic behavior at that age even close to Christmas.
Then there was the nativity or manger scene if you will, circa 1950. We still display it every year along with a couple of others that followed yonder star to our humble abode. It’s a complete set with Mary, Joseph, and the baby Jesus attended by a camel, donkey, some sheep, a shepherd, a couple of angels and the three wise men. Bethlehem was on top of the television. That was in the days of console TV’s. Wouldn’t work with today’s flat screens. They’d have to have suction-cup feet and be a good bit thinner. Like Spiderman on Slim Fast.
The best part of having those wonderful figures on display was playing Nativity Chess. Mom would carefully place each piece. But they wouldn’t stay that way. Whenever any of us had a moment alone with the scene, we would arrange the figures to suit whatever our interpretation of that night in the city of David was at the moment. That would last until the next family member strolled past. We all did it except for my dad. He was always more of a checkers man.
The best we could ever hope to achieve in Nativity Chess was check. Checkmate can never be achieved at Christmas. That comes at Easter and it’s not our move to make.
