The Post of Christmas Past

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Today is December 25 and, like Ebenezer Scrooge, I’m casting my eyes out my window onto the snowy, blowy streets and across the fruit orchards with wonderment and warmth and gratitude.

Of course there is no young boy passing by to whom I can toss a farthing to purchase the biggest turkey in the butcher’s display, and that’s OK. Not everything must be Dickensian…

This frosty morning I’m pulling forward a flashback to Christmas of 2012, a mere 10 years back when I posted the following little essay.

I’m not sure that it’s aged well (much like me!) over a short timeframe, but it is what it is.

Maybe this provides you an opportunity to reflect on who would sit at your holiday table today if you had a magic wand to enact any scenario you wished.

And… a final note: Christmas gives us an opportunity to reflect and to be thankful, and I want to say a big thank you to each and every one of you for reading my posts and offering comments or opinions, whether through this site, Facebook, e-mail or personal contact!

May all your wishes come true, today and in your many many years to come…

Now friends, let’s fly back 10 years to a Post of Christmas Past…

HAPPY HOLIDAYS 2012!

The year end is approaching quickly.  And this means that many of us spend the long, dark wintry days turning inwards, becoming introspective, seeking meaning and reason in life. Do you think there’s more to it all than Facebook?

This search may be especially true for those of us who don’t put our trust in a higher power or being. Not believing in a deity and/or afterlife significantly compresses the time allotted for finding significance to our existence.

After all, to us heathens, existence and eternity usually means something like 40 up to about 100 years, really not a whole lot of time after you make your bed, eat breakfast, brush your teeth, and sleep.

Turn off the TV I tell myself, time is running out. Time management for the atheist is the #1 priority right after food and sex!

So I say…

Damn you Christians with your eternal time in heaven with all of your loved ones and no worries about global warming.”

Damn you Muslims and your reward of 72 (some say only 40) virgins.”

Damn you Buddhists and your Nirvana and reincarnation.”

I won’t damn YOU Jews since you’re a bit confused on the whole afterlife side of things already, so why should I make you suffer more consternation with my words.”

Christmas 2012 will be unusual in my world as this will be the first time in 27 years that we’ve not had all or most of our 3 kids at home. They’ve provided the meaning to the season for so long, that I’ve forgotten that there were other reasons, you know… all of that birth of Christ child stuff and Wise Men and Shepherds and HOHOHO and pretty girls… oops sorry, I’ve slipped off on a Charlie Brown tangent. Blockhead!

Since the Christmas dinner table will be extra light on offspring this year, I’ve decided to enjoy a very special Christmas meal serving up 6 courses of my most appealing and satisfying guests from now and days gone by.

      Let’s Eat…   

Course 1 – Appetizers

With Authors James Michener and Leon Uris… a dinner that starts with appetizers should be filled with creative ideas and thought to whet the appetite. These guys aren’t literary heavyweights. But they have written a huge volume of amazingly researched, diverse, and well-written historical fiction covering all parts of the world.

I devoured their books in earlier years. And today I’d love to bite into some of their ideas on the writing process and organization.

I’m astonished by those who can be so determined to focus and deliver a huge body of work in one lifetime. Sure they’re old white guys, but inspiration comes in all colours, ages, and genders. 

I also loved radically individualistic Ayn Rand’s ideas in my younger days, but just can’t bring myself around to her level of narcissism at this point in my life. Fortunately, just looking in my bathroom’s mirror and seeing the “funhouse” image it reflects back is enough to keep me grounded!

Course 2 – Soup

With My Mom...Warm and inviting and full of goodness, this soup course will be my visit with a Ghost of Christmas Past.

It will be wonderful to have my Mom at my table this year. It’s been 39 years since she died and I was last able to sit at her table and share in the Christmas feast. She made the BEST roast potatoes.

Like any good, doting son, I’d want to tell her how much I love her and miss her after all of these years.

As the first person I encountered in life who showed me unconditional love, I would want to tell her about my successes and mistakes, knowing that she would listen, but not judge. And I’d want to tell her that she gave me the grounding and support I needed to go out and make a pretty damn good life, despite all of my fears and worries (Mom was a HUGE worrier herself). And I’d want to apologize to her for not knowing the basics of CPR when she needed it back in 1973.

Course 3 – Salad

Buffett is my favourite ninja…

With Legendary Investor Warren Buffett… what would a Christmas buffet be without a Buffett?

Well, not overly filling, but chock full of nutritious thoughts and concepts. Buffett is known as the Oracle of Omaha, and probably the best stock market investor of this generation. He’s also such a folksy kind of guy.

It should be fun to have him at the table, telling little stories about life and making great stock investments. It’s not very often that you meet people who are highly intelligent and independent-thinking who can also relate to people in a relaxed and personal way.

Making billions of dollars, almost all of which will go to charity when he dies, while playing a silly NINJA makes him my kind of guy. Buffett can take a story about a one-armed baseball player and an Iowa chicken and make a heartfelt parable of it that relates directly to the reality and oftentimes insanity of the investment world.

Course 4 – Main Entree

With Former U.S. President Bill Clinton… Clinton needs to be the main course because, despite his personal foibles (I’m buying you pants without a zipper for Christmas, Bill!), he’s one of the most substantial minds in the whole wide political world.

Clinton, like Obama, is one of the seemingly few rational and caring political-type Americans out there today. Clinton can spontaneously dissect just about any complex world issue and bring to it a common sense approach and potential solution.

There are many minds out there to admire, but Bill Clinton’s is at the top of my list. One discussion with Bill and I’ll be feeling overfull this Christmas.

Course 5 – Dessert

With Actress Reese Witherspoon… dessert should be a light, fluffy, and sugary sweet confection.

The perfect dessert, like fine wine, also has an underlying layer of complexity and depth. This is why I’ve invited actress Reese Witherspoon to this occasion rather than my gut-instinctive initial choice, Pamela Anderson.

The Queen of Jiggle, Anderson is just too much fluffy cotton candy that leaves me feeling sickly nauseous after consuming. The first lick is sensually encouraging, but a few bites later you can only feel regret.

I like Witherspoon even though she isn’t my favourite actress… she is sweet and light, but hidden behind her fluff-laden translucent facade is a woman of some core substance. She has a nice finish on the palate that leaves me satisfied and wanting more.

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Course 6 – Cheese and Wine

With Singers/Songwriters Carole King and James Taylor… it takes two to finish this delectable Christmas dinner because they’re inescapably intertwined for me.

After a large repast with so much to digest, some harmony is needed in this course for settling purposes.

Other beautifully harmonious cheese and wine pairings could be Simon and Garfunkel, Karen and Richard Carpenter, Don Henley and Glenn Frey, Lennon and McCartney, Milli Vanilli (just kidding there!).

But ultimately, what better finish could there be to a meal filled with symbolism and meaning shared with friends and relatives than with a blending of voices in “You’ve Got A Friend”? Whenever I’ve been “down and troubled”, a touch of musical melancholy from either of these two feels like rays of warm sunshine on the first sunny April day.

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Finally, the anxiously anticipated Christmas dinner is done, the turkey (tofurkey maybe!) has been deboned and made ready for next week’s soup and sandwiches.

There’s an awareness of satisfaction in knowing that we’ve made it through another year, however tumultuous or sensational.  A year filled with events that made us jubilant, made us cry, made us impatient, made us content, made us angry, made us appreciate.

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So. Merry Christmas, Happy Hannukah, Happy Kwanza, Splendid Solstice… whatever you choose to pay tribute to, I celebrate with you and I can only hope that your gala feast with whomever you’d relish sharing it, is SPECTACULAR!