Back way then, Christmases as a child growing up in Winterthing Ordinary were much less complicated. No, on second thoughts, make that much-of-a-muchness, less complicated. Let me count the ways, like stations of a lost past.
Thusly, with my Dylan Thomas firmly tucked under one arm, let me revisit with you, dear readers, the stations of Christmas innocence [and simplicity]:
1. Back then, a gift was not a right. Or an entitlement. It was a gift. Sometimes it was only a gift.
2. Christmas was synonymous with snow. Snow on snow. Somehow, they were joined together at the holiday ‘hip’. There was never one without the other.
3. Christmas was, back then, blissfully short. Perhaps one or two days before, then the actual day, with St. Stephen’s Day bringing up the ‘rear’. I should add that, commercially, it lasted maybe all of four days, from the hanging of the first decoration to the singing of The Wren Song. Spiritually [and mystically], it lasted twelve days…long before that maudlin song was invented.
4. Some years, St. Stephens’ Day was ‘bigger’ than Christmas. It connected children to ancient pagan rites of winter that none of us quite understood, but nevertheless felt a need to perpetuate. It was, back then, an inexplicable mystery.
5. Similarly, Christmas was a mystery. Somehow the organized religion version ended up confusing style with substance and ended up glorifying neither.
6. Santa Claus was a real person, who lived in the hearts and imaginations of young children. There was no willing suspension of disbelief back then–no one doubted Santa’s existence, and no one thought he died when a child turned ten [or thereabouts]. And he certainly didn’t live at ‘the Mall’.
7. Christmas brought out our finest behaviors. Good manners, too. Everyone was living [and being watched] inside Santa Snow Shakers. No one…repeat no one…wanted the dreaded coal. And there was also the Mars Boat, moored just offshore, like some Black Pearl, ready to ferry mischievous children off to Tortuga and a life of mischief.
8. There were NO gift lists. Wants and needs were not to be confused with hope or belief. And there were no Black Fridays, Cyber Mondays, Purple Wednesdays…thankfully.
9. Most years, Christmas fitted into one stocking, hanging by a smoldering peat fire. But the real Christmas was suspended between the twin mysteries of anticipation and imagination…and we never confused it with material instant gratifications.
10. It was not uncommon to see sleds parked outside the local Chapel, just inside the Liberties. Mass over, on the sled careening down the Fishamble hill –and the last one down to the Liffey bought a round of gobstoppers.
11. Back then, Santa was never to be found in department stores. That would have been unthinkable as well as stabbing the Christmas mystery through the heart. And, since no one ever saw Santa [except in picture books], belief was exalted.
12. Christmas trees were real back then. Creches, if they existed at all, were inside churches. Carols were sung inside churches. And, incense notwithstanding, the Christmas mystery was everywhere…except inside the Churches.
No one told us what to believe. No one showed us how to believe. No one led us to believe this action or that deed. Back then belief was unconditional. But, somewhere along the way, the truths of Christmas mysteries were bartered for the trifles of pinchbeck hedonism. And that’s the moment when Innocence was left behind…at a small village called ‘Forgotten, Ordinary….’
