Merry Christmas

Look how much my son grew from last Christmas, his first, to his second this year.

Christmas Eve has always been my favorite holiday, but this year I gave a lot of thought to why it's better than Christmas Day. Growing up, my family carried out most of its traditions on Christmas Eve night, lighting candles throughout the house, reading the Christmas story from the Bible, and listening to an old-timey radio show of Sir Laurence Olivier doing Dicken's A Christmas Carol (where he does all the characters' voices himself). Christmas morning our only traditions were taking our stockings back to our beds until everyone was awake, waiting to open presents until my dad had lit the fireplace and started playing the Porter Co. Music Box Christmas. Nothing on Christmas Day could match the feeling, a combination of anticipation and reverence, from Christmas Eve. Gift-giving was the only thing we did that day with reference to the original Nativity scene and the meaning of Christmas. I know that many families open all their presents on Christmas Eve. What then is left for the main holiday? Perhaps church services are held the night before so that families can stay together the whole next day. My parents wouldn't let us go out and play with neighbor kids, no matter how many knocked on the door. I guess even more important than a baby being born was a family being brought together by that birth - the entire human family. Last night, my wife and I layed on the couch, looking at the lights on the tree, listening to the complete Nutcracker, and reminisced about all the Christmases past since we've known each other. Our first date was to The Nutcracker ballet. I'd already known her for months but I knew I loved her that night. I proposed two years later on the anniversary of that date. I didn't realize till last night that we already had a family tradition going before we were ever married.