I'm hiding out, really. You need to know that my bride is the Queen of Christmas, and it is always like pulling teeth when we get to January 6th—the Epiphany. Because it is then, you see, that all the decor must come down. Susan is always resistant, and we have the annual tug-of-war between my need to not look like a complete idiot to the neighbors (most of whom took their decorations down and threw their trees out on January 2) and her love of Christmastide.
She usually wins, at least for a couple of days.
Today is the 9th, and she is de-christmasifying the house. But she is not particularly happy about it. I know it will take probably 24 hours before I can strip the lights from the tree and get it out, hopefully with a minimum of needle dispersal on the way out the door. I am not certain we are within the time allotted by the city for curbside removal of the dead trees and wreaths... but hope springs eternal.
The biggest reason she so adores the season is that Susan really does get Christmas. It is not just the nostalgic watching of Capra and Crosby. It's not only the eggnog laced liberally with nutmeg, or the "fluffy eggs" Christmas breakfast (which this year we moved to dinner!). It is her deep understanding that God came to rescue her, that the Child in a feed trough is not some sweet and sentimental story, but one filled with blood and earth. It is fierce and tragic, and it is a story of amazing love and sacrifice. It cost God everything to rescue her; and she knows it.
The last of the three gifts the strange astrologers from the East brought to the child Jesus was the gift of myrrh. Myrrh is a fragrant gum resin, and it shows up again some three decades later, when the religious leader Nicodemus brings it to apply to Jesus' tortured and wracked body pulled from the cross and laid in another man's tomb. It was a rush job, because it was approaching the Sabbath when all work must cease.
I have to wonder if His poor mother, seeing the gift Nicodemus brought, remembered the offering which the Magi from Persia carried to Jesus those thirty-some years prior, in a foreshadowing of immense and apocalyptic import.
Beautifully said. And I empathize with your bride. "Breakin' down Christmas" (which we've tried to turn into a festive event, a la my Appalachian forbears) is always painful in these parts. I'm glad that even when the lights come down, the Light can keep burning in our hearts...and we can keep Christmas all year!
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