2008.12.25
Finding Christmas joy during lean times
The packages are unwrapped, and fewer bows and colorful paper litter the floor today. You didn't get the gift you wanted, and maybe not the one you really needed.
And you're OK with that.
Christmas 2008 -- and perhaps most of 2009 -- will be remembered as the time that brought America back to its center.
Not to its political center, but back to the core values that matter most. Hardship and uncertainty have a way of distilling the meaningful from the insignificant.
This Christmas, as debt holds consumers in a stranglehold and holiday splurges of recent years now seem like regrettable folly, families are rediscovering the real joy of Christmas.
Christmas is family and friends. It is peace and good will. It is God's love wrapped in swaddling clothes, the eternal hope that girds in uncertain times such as these.
Christmas is the gift of all of those things.
This year, America has come back to that.
Many of us lived through the days of largesse. We stopped giving from the heart and started giving for the sake of giving.
("I don't know what to get auntie. She has everything and doesn't need anything, but I've got to get her something.")
Don't get me wrong. I don't decry gift-giving -- for the right reasons -- and I can never deny the children. But as we became more and more consumed by crass commercialism, we seemed to pay less attention to the real reason for the season.
Then the stock market tanked, major banks failed, and the layoffs began. That stuff has been the catalyst for the nation's change of heart.
I've spoken with people who say they are cutting back -- because of economics.
But the lean times also have made folks recall the days when they didn't have much under the tree. They were just as happy.
One time, I asked my father, who is now deceased, what he used to get for Christmas as a boy growing up in Depression-era Mississippi.
As a typical middle-class kid who never wanted for much, I remember being appalled when he said that his parents would give him and his three brothers and sister each a shoe box containing an orange, an apple and some nuts. In good years, they'd get a candy cane, too.
At other times, he would talk about how his family was poor, but he didn't realize it because they were like everyone else.
By today's standards, they had nothing. But they had each other.
We may not have as much this year. But if we look closely, we have more than we realize.
Hold dear those friends and family. Laugh, cry and share fellowship with them.
And ask yourself: What's really important right now?
What is really important? That is easy to answer this Christmas.
After losing one of my dearest friends a few weeks ago to cancer, I realized my greatest gift was being with him for nearly twelve hours before he died -- which he chose to do shortly after I left his bedside. Two weeks later another friend was diagnosed with cancer. This Christmas, I see life and my friends through different eyes. The gift of friendship is more important than any other gifts given or received. Everyone I know is experiencing something very different in the air this year. There is a new appreciation for what is really important. I am glad.
As I slept-in late this Christmas morning, I am just now drinking my morning OJ and reading the paper. Shanna, your column is always the first thing I reach for and I want you to know that you are important to me. Thank you for starting my morning with another uplifting and thought provoking column. God Bless you and Merry Christmas.
Comment by Ms. Goldenwillow — December 25, 2008 @ 10:06 am
Another excellent article, Shanna. Yes, we need to examine our values. Whatever our gifts to others may be, they are puny compared to the gift from God. That is the gift we should focus on during Christmas and the rest of the year.
Comment by LRS — December 25, 2008 @ 4:35 pm
My Christmas gift came last Friday, when after 3 very long years I met my youngest grandson, aged 3, and visted with his 5 year old brother and his Dad, my son. I won't go into the reasons for the speration of too many years, but I was well aware a blessing was given,and prayers were heard. The 3 year old has been struggling for 2 years and with a diagnoisis of OMS[www.omsusa.org] he will struggle even more, as will his parents. But the prayers of many have been with this little one, and I knew I was in the presence of an Angel, who is pure love and beauty. And I was very grateful and humbled. Please pray for Charlie Crosson, Angela and IV for the strenght to keep climbing those mountains. And I Thank each and evey one of you. Never give up hope, ever..
Blessings..
Comment by Dona Wheeler — December 25, 2008 @ 10:01 pm
Shanna:
I remember when your father died, and how I was touched by your column about him. I wish I had the privilege of having known him personally.
Dona, I hope that your little grandson will soon be blessed with good health and the strength to continue fighting his battle.
For those of you who have lost your loved ones, my deepest sympathies go out to you. It is the holidays which are the toughest to endure following such a life-changing event.
Comment by Mike — December 26, 2008 @ 2:54 am
Thank you for the gift of another year of thought provoking commentary, always in elegant prose, on life in Roanoke and beyond. You brighten our cityscape!!
Comment by doug robison — December 28, 2008 @ 9:10 am