Unwrapping day

During a recent family tragedy, we were overwhelmed by messages from friends and relatives that they would “pray” for us. I understand the sentiment – they want to be helpful, but are miles away and can’t do anything but offer moral support. The closer to the victims of the tragedy, the more that wonderful people offered real help, support, hugs and tears and consolation. They did so because they could, because they are real, loving and caring people. Those who could not offer real help would do so if they were closer at hand. The “prayer” is really just a way of saying “I feel compassion for you, I hurt for you.” As I told one person who wondered if I, as a nonbeliever, appreciated his prayers, I said that I welcomed all good thoughts and feelings, no matter how he chose to express them.

As I have aged and endured suffering, as we all do, I’ve come to think of Christmas as a pagan holiday masked with our own religious mythologies. It is no coincidence that it happens around the solstice, and the wasting of perfectly healthy trees and references to virgin births go back far into our history, long before 6CE, the year of the Census of Quirinius that might be the one referenced in the Bible. In the modern era, the holiday is also swathed and swaddled in commercial ideology – the need to buy and wrap is deeply embedded in us. “What to buy for someone who does not need anything?” Well, I’ve got to buy him something, anything. I’ll spend an hour at COSTCO and find some Chinese merchandise that he will put on a shelf in his garage and someday donate to Goodwill.

Children are showered with gifts, but are not capable of true appreciation for things that they did not know they wanted, much less needed. A child is capable of expressing only so much appreciation, usually verbally expressed at the parent’s command. That same appreciation is divided by two with two gifts, and with ten gifts is hardly expressed at all, as the child is no longer grateful, but is instead looking for things that offer more than a moment’s satisfaction. Children are children, and I like them just like everyone else, but I deliberately avoid the unwrapping ceremonies. It’s a little unsettling.

The important thing is that I spent some money, so that merchants have a good holiday season. How does a good holiday season translate into our “common good”? It offers people some part-time employment without benefits, and is a great jobs program for the republic … of China.

So here is how we celebrate Christmas: We observe it, in the true sense of “observe.” Mostly, we just watch what is going on around us. We have a tree, because grandchildren expect that of us. We don’t go to church, just as with all other days. We have a nice meal, my wife and I exchange gift that we think really might bring some joy to one another. We devise a letter that tells of all the events in our small family over the past year, avoiding any reference to “straight A’s” and the invention of vaccines and work in Calcutta.

But the truth is that in our family we have one daughter who actually did pull straight A’s for two years (having belatedly discovering her inner student), and another who is working in Haiti for the Canadian Red Cross. She is witnessing true suffering and first world indifference to the third world, and thereby gaining true wisdom. We didn’t do those things, we didn’t cause those nice things to happen. But it was worthy of mention. The rest of our kids are just doing what they do, surviving and making their way.

And that’s about it. I want the holiday to end soon so that David Sirota and the Daily Show and Bill Maher return. It’s also a hump – six weeks after New Year’s day, pitchers and catchers report to spring training.

Now that should be a holiday!