Not!

I am well aware that this is not the most wonderful time of the year for many. Personally experiencing the “empty nest” syndrome with neither daughter home anymore, I can empathize with the feeling that Christmas isn’t quite all that it’s cracked up to be. Nonetheless, I know of no other season that so dramatically affects human rhyme and reason the way this one does. It occurred to me that the first two songs I remember Mom teaching me were Away in a Manger and Jingle Bells. Among my earliest memories is of a Christmas gathering in the basement of the Platteville church at which Santa Claus made an appearance. Holy smokes! What other holiday assimilates both the baby Jesus and Kris Kringle? Christmas truly offers something for almost everyone and that’s part of its magical appeal. For me, disappointment generally follows unrealistic expectations. So, if I expect that Christmas is going to make someone like President Bush more intelligent, I will in all likelihood be profoundly disappointed. If, on the other hand, I expect that the glorious beauty of the occasion will far outweigh W’s stupidity, I will be rewarded by holding to a more realistic expectation. In other words, I think that Christmas is what we make of it. If it’s the joy in children’s eyes, crinkled smiles on aged faces, and a genuine hope that a world into which the Christ is born cannot help but be better than what we have, then that’s a Christmas I expect to enjoy to its fullest.