It seems to me that the magic of Christmas is reinforced by its many traditions. These little bits of nostalgia bring us warm memories of good days passed, and these recollections reinforce the splendor of the season.
As I reflect on the traditions that I hold near, it seems to me there are three types of Christmas traditions…
1) The traditions we repeat each year, look forward to, and love. Traditions like going home, snowball fights, a Christmas Eve reading of the book of Matthew, brunch and dinner, stockings, egg nog toasts and hundreds more.
2) The traditions we continue to dabble in, but don’t really like. Tasting a single brussel sprout, waking up at 7 a.m. to open presents, playing a post-present board game.
3) Then there are the “traditions” that miss the mark. The ones you try out once, but will likely not soon repeat. Watching Die Hard on Christmas Eve and calling it a Christmas movie “this is Christmas music “, turducken, and most recently going to see the Nutcracker Ballet.
As I sat there with Laura, listening to familiar songs played by the orchestra and watching those dozens of dancers clad in vibrant colors prancing around on tiptoe, I was bored. I didn’t really get it.
I couldn’t help but thinking that the whole thing was a little bit dum dum-dum-dum-dum dum-dum dum-dum-dum dum-dum-dum dum-dum-dum dum-dum dum-dum dum.
One Comment
So you’ve tried your one brussel sprout. What does your mother say? Maybe next year you’ll like it 🙂