In a restaurant recently, I overheard a conversation take place between to crusty old birds that went something like this:

“Watcha doin’ for Christmas, Joe?”

“Nothing,” Joe responded before taking a big swig of coffee and diving into his bacon and eggs.

“ Plan on visiting the kids?”

“Naw,” Joe snorted. “I’m tired of all that Christmas crap. Think I’ll just stay home this year, open a can of beans. You?”

“Ain’t doin’ nothing neither,” Andy replied, then harrumphed. “They make too damn much out of Christmas nowadays. And I ain’t spending no more money on kids that don’t bother picking up the phone the rest of the year. Who the hell put Christ in Christmas anyway? They say he was born in April.”

“Hallmark,” Joe responded.

“Hallmark?”

“Yeah, Hallmark,” Joe sniffed again before slamming his toast back into the thick egg yolks staring up at him. “Those card companies started the whole shebang just to make a fast buck. Notice that Kwanzai thing coming up the ranks now?”

“What the hell is that?”

“Kwanzai, bonsai, something like that. Check out the card shop. Whole rows of cards for somethin’ I only just heard about and you ain’t, til now. And Hanukah. Never used to see but a couple a cards for that, now they have their own section. I just quit buying cards altogether. Too damn commercial for me.”

“Yup,” Andy said, pushing his empty plate back and nodding to the waitress for a refill. “Christmas has just got too commercial for my blood. I for one am abstainin’ from here on out. Doin’ anything New Year’s?”

“Naw,” Joe said, finished with his breakfast and now beginning to clean his teeth with his tongue. “Think I’ll just open up another can of beans. Maybe add a beer to the menu.”

Andy gave Joe a half-grin and winked at the waitress hovering over his coffee cup. “Well, just keep on eatin’ those beans all Christmas week, Joe, and come New Year’s you just might see the year out with a real bang.”

My husband looked down at his plate, stifling a grin and reserving his comments for the car trip home.

Being married to a European has given me pause to consider the American commercialism regarding the holidays. But, it has also given me pause to reflect on what is good about holidays in America as well.

We’re a mobile society, so we travel a lot during the holidays, back and forth between relatives and friends scattered about the country. We travel to one another's homes in an attempt to gather together for something that gives meaning to us. And that something, whether we realize it or not, is what is called tradition and ceremony.

Everyone, in one-way or another has tradition and ceremony that ties together years of memories. Perhaps old aunt Emma brings her famous fruitcake along to family gatherings. Famous because she has been making the dratted cake for fifty years straight and no one ever eats the thing; they only groan when they see her lifting the platter of the sandy tasting stuff high.

But when the inevitable Christmas holiday comes along that Aunt Emma is no longer on earth, she and her dry-as-sand fruitcake will be sorely missed. There will be a hole in the day. Because old Aunt Emma brought something more important than her fruitcake to the Christmas gathering. She brought the TRADITION of it with her. The silent groans, eyes rolling, the compulsory smiles as one washed the cake down with a glass of cold milk so as not to steal the glimmer from Aunt Emma’s eye, that is what she brought to the family. They are all memories that will be cherished when Aunt Emma is long gone. And with those memories will be others attached, the wonderful smells of Christmas past, the laughter, the hugs, the warm conversations that took place.

Memories of bonding on a soul level. That was the true recipe in Aunt Emma's fruitcake.

Admittedly, Americans have a tendency to commercialize everything. That is the emotional/material matrix that so many choose to live in as they search for another aspect of themselves. Most people need to rethink the commercialism aspect. But to give up entirely on the holidays is to give up a bit of ourselves. For our lives are entwined in spirit through ceremony and tradition.

Good or bad, positive or negative, tradition and ceremony bond us together. Births, deaths, marriages, these are all important rites of passage that carry with it centuries old traditions and ceremony. No matter what part of the world you live in or come from, no matter what culture or religion you grew up in, there always existed ceremony and tradition surrounding such events.

It is the glue that sticks memory to us and bonds us heart and soul.

Long after we’ve out grown the pajamas Grandma always insisted on giving us, long after the new ice skates that glinted under the Christmas tree and caused our pulses to race have come and gone, will live on the memory of a father ceremoniously climbing a ladder year after year to top a tree with the same ornament that has been in the family since mom and dad’s first Christmas together. Long after Dad has joined old Aunt Emma in the heavens will the vivid memories remain of whatever you practiced in the way of ceremony and tradition.

The scents and songs of my Christmas youth – they are stirred memories for me come the holiday season. My husband has his as well. And so when we married seven years ago we combined them, adding more as we go along.

I am aware of the vital importance of ceremony and tradition on a metaphysical level. I haven’t spent a Christmas eve at my sister’s house in twenty years, but mention Christmas eve with her and the scent of buttery oyster stew, aromatic homemade bread filled with a thick meat and cabbage mixture and the men in the household assembling those last minute toys at midnight washes through me. Where did her tradition of this soup and bread concoction come from? Somewhere in her European travels this tradition touched her soul and so she brought it back with her, heralded it as a touch point for her and her family every Christmas Eve.

I couldn’t begin tell you what was in those packages under my sister's Christmas tree. But her tradition still washes through me and stimulates good memories after all these years.

Whether you live alone, gather for huge family gatherings, or have no family and gather with friends, the point is that if you make it a point to bring tradition and ceremony into your life, then you will bond heart and soul with one another, long after that other is gone from your life.

Good or bad, you have a choice. Is it becoming tradition now for Joe and Andy to get together at the local diner and grumble about not participating in the holidays?

We moved to our new home in June of this year. Today, in the middle of writing this piece, our neighbor down the road, owner of the William Seward Inn, called and asked us over for a Victorian Christmas feast. Beside the fact that he happens to be one heck of a chef, and without question the food will be awesome, comes a bigger reason why I said yes without bothering to ask my husband if he was amenable to the idea. I feel more at home here than any place I have ever lived. We intend to be here the rest of our lives. And even though our kids are grown and off on their own, and only our “furr kids” remain, I want the tradition and ceremony of gathering together during this holiday season to gather momentum and depth – and good memories.

A Victorian “Dickens” Christmas dinner - I think I like that one.

From our home to yours, we extend our wishes that you experience a wonderful holiday season filled with tradition and ceremony. Join us next year?

Hans, Kathleen, Bear and Hamish

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