It's The Most Wonderful Reflection Time of the Year

Excuse the variation in my subject head, 'It's The Most Wonderful Reflection Time of the Year', to the classic Christmas song with the nearly identical title. I couldn't resist, because during and after Christmas my thoughts go to, not what just happened this Christmas, but to random memories of Christmas past. Most of those memories are of the routine and what seemed at the time they were created to be trivial. Why is it so? Why do humans need those past memories, especially when they are making more current ones of the holiday?

Do we need to reflect during emotional times in order to cope with the mad world in which we live? I think so. I am surprised at the variety of old Christmas memories I get each Christmas. And the variety of them varies year to year. I suppose these memories are a defense mechanism against the frustrations we feel at Christmas. This year, for instance, I was sick with a terrible virus. Being locked in the house in misery I had a kaleidoscope of past Christmas memories that seemed to come from nowhere.

A memory of my childhood pet dog's 'Dumbo' (that dog must have been named after me) Christmas sweater; my dad every year placing under the tree the "extra present" , a box of Russell Stover dark chocolate caramels; my mother's baking of so many cheesecakes for friends and her making a few mini ones for me; little me sitting on Santa's knee at D.H. Holmes and asking for a the tape recorder I was to receive that  next Christmas morning.

On the surface there is noting significant about those memories.....or is there? They must be like our dreams, coded messages of importance that we may or may not figure out consciously, but which our subconscious decodes and uses to keep us sane. I think that I remembered I my dad giving me my favorite candy and my mom baking as a reminder of their love for me and the stability of our family. But I also suspect that our "bad memories" serve us in much the same way. They remind us to create no more bad ones,, to enjoy what we have and to find meaning it whatever it is. Though I am lucky to have few bad memories, the one that never fails to arrive each Christmas is that of the death of my brother on Christmas Day, my finding his lifeless body on the floor of his home..

The odd thing about all of those post Christmas Day memories is how short lived they are. They come at holiday time, retreat and disappear and there is rarely a need for most of us to create any new ones as a replacement. Next year we will be gifted with new memories on which to reflect. I suspect they are the medicine that soothes or even cures our affliction and then is placed away into a drawer until the next need for them.

Yes, Christmas memories can be the most wonderful reflections of the year. I hope you had and made many this year.