Remembering Now Long Dead Christmas Traditions

Christmas is over. There is a little deflation after the end of Christmas because people change their outlook and behavior so to a positive one much during the lead up to and to Christmas Day. Humans become better people during Christmas, probably a herd mentality reaction because the masses create that idea. It's a good thing but impossible to maintain all year, as due to their imperfections most people can't show "good will and love" toward their fellow humans for too long. Haha It would kill them to do so.

Next is one of my least favorite holidays, New Year's. It's the one I call the "Artificial holiday". Other than when I was a child and so loved to shoot fireworks after Christmas through New Year's Eve, I have largely ignored New Year's Eve, a time when the drunks and drunk wannabe's roam and carnage the rest of humanity in the name of....I am not sure. A drunk at New Year's Eve is only slightly less threatening than an attacking viking raider.

So while I ignore New Year's Eve and New Year's day I am pondering some of the old childhood traditions my family had during Christmas. As children we hardly notice them, but as our family dies and the traditions disappear we strangely retrieve them from our memories. I think they give us comfort in dealing with the present since most of us idealize our childhood and would like to relive it if possible. My mom was the one in charge of all the holiday festivities. Most moms are, given they more often have a more pronounced sensitivity than do the males of the family.

One such tradition I remember was my mother playing her Christmas record albums in the house. She would start playing those LP albums after Thanksgiving and could be heard until after New Year's. We all liked it and it gave us both an appreciation of the holiday and of music. Now I play Christmas music on my computer every Christmas season Christmas music is simple, but pure. Sometimes while the records play my mom would make cheesecake, the same cheesecake recipe that I make today. Her recipe was excellent and requested by many. My mom used to bake several to give as presents. One year I remember she didn't make a cheesecake for a family friend and the friend was very upset. My mom n ever forgot to make one for her after that mistake.

Another tradition we had was to open the presents Christmas morning. In our family Santa Claus never came on Christmas Eve, so we didn't open them at that time a so many families do. The routine was to awaken, eat breakfast, go to Christmas mass and return to open the presents. My parents were generous and always satisfied me with the unexpected and the familiar (one was a box of Russell Stover Chocolate covered caramels that I adored and got every year). When my daughter was small we followed the same Christmas present opening ritual.

Decorating for Christmas was always elaborate and started the day after Thanksgiving. My mother decorated for every holiday and was in charge of all the interior decorations, while my dad and my brother and I put up the outside lights and other decorations. I still love decorations. There are many who think Christmas decorations, either the tacky kind of the fancy, are silly or "too much work". Those people have no Christmas soul. I feel sorry for them and hope they will one day find one. When I was a child we had no led lights. Instead it was the old and short lived colored bulb. Changing those things was a full time job, particularly when pranksters (like me) would loosened some of them, to make them appear to be burned out, at neighborhood houses to make it appear they were burned out. We thought that kind of Christmas prank was fun. It was a destructive as we got in those harmless days.

There were quite a few more of those family traditions, but no need to write about them. Instead, you can think about your own traditions, at Christmas or anytime. Happy New Year.