Christmas

As a retail dawg, Christmas becomes nothing more than customer service, get the book in the customers' hands, get their wallets open, get their money and get them out the door, and then repeat the process about a thousand times over the four weeks between Thanksgiving and Christmas Eve. Add overdone Christmas songs and you get the picture. It is a very tiring time of year. Its tiring for those who don't work retail, too, but for those of us in retail it can be especially trying when it comes to something as simple as buying Christmas presents for loved ones. Just the thought of going into a mall or a store is enough to make me just stay in my room and huddle in a corner.

But at the same time, there is something that I have that keeps me going. The fact that this is a celebration of Christ's birth. I watched a program about the history of Christmas a few weeks ago. And they said that many scholars believe that Christ was actually born sometime in the spring. Tonight while listening to Christmas story being read from the book of Luke I noticed that Luke wrote that "in the sixth month" was the census that took Joseph and Mary to Bethlehem. So, I pulled out my faithful ten fingers and did some math. Sixth month equals June. Nine months from June is April. Okay, I can dig that. Now, if I remember correctly, the calendar of Jesus' time was different than the one we use now. So the months might be screwed up, but that's okay, I don't think it makes that much of a deal.

I had to work until 630 this evening. So, I had to race to get to church on time, I probably broke a few speed laws, but I got there and it felt good to sit and participate in the service. All the songs were there, the scriptures, too. It felt good, like a glove. I sat along the edge of the church because I got there a bit late. My pastor made a point that I hadn't realy thought of before when he said that Jesus was wrapped in clothe twice: once at his birth and once at his death. That was circular to me and to my English major mind it was great symbolism and foreshadowing and all that good stuff.

Its lonely driving around on Christmas Eve night. Everything is closed. There is no place to eat and even most stores have their signs turned off. A few years ago, I was driving home from work and it was very cold. I mean really cold. I was hungry and I was on my way to church. I knew I needed something to eat, but I couldn't find anything until I came upon a Subway sandwich shop that was still open. It was next to a Chinese food restaraunt, that was open, but I didn't feel like I could that much of a holiday cliche at the time.

Merry Christmas everyone and may you all have a blessed and safe holiday.

Peace to all of you.