The Joy of Christmas

It's "that time of the year" again, the time of year that Johnny Mathis tells us is "the most wonderful time of the year," with the principal themes being snow and presents and flying reindeer and Christmas trees and housebreaking elves and joy and oh yeah... there's often something in there about Jesus and shepherds and Heavenly Hosts of angels, too.

With all of that going on, it's easy to see how some people (those who overthink everything, mostly) might become conflicted about "the true meaning of Christmas."  That's  a no-win question to ask, though, because obviously Christmas (like almost everything else) is in the eye of the beholder.  As Lassie's grandfather, Gene Lockhart, pronounces from the bench in the 1947 classic (i.e., the "real") movie "Miracle on 34th Street," when it comes to Santa Claus, at least, "Many people firmly believe in him.  Others do not."  It should go without saying that the same holds true for Jesus of Nazareth.

Believers of all stripes tend to agree that Christmas is supposed to be a time for fellowship and good cheer and helping the poor.  (You should have gotten all the giving of thanks out of the way a few weeks ago, because there's a special holiday just for that, backed up by a Presidential proclamation.)  Gift-giving is also very important, and it is the absolute only time you're going to see wonderful holiday treats like egg nog and fruitcake.  (Brrr!)

Christmas is a time for family, they say, and that's probably one of the reasons that Christmases all tend to blur together over the years, because families are steeped in crazy traditions.  According to my mother, in my birth family we had a tradition of never eating Christmas dinner.  For a while I was married, and in my "in-law" family they had a tradition of having two Christmas trees and a six-hour stint of gift exchanges that began at 4 a.m. and involved literally dozens of packages for each person (some of which were "real" presents, and some of which were stuff like tubes of toothpaste and rolls of tape.)  And sometimes families vow, for one reason or another, not to decorate, "gift," or celebrate at all and the day winds up as gloomy as almost any other day in houses like that.

We had a thing for a couple of years called "The War on Christmas," and what was up with that?  Apparently, some large retailers decided (or were pressured into deciding, depending upon whom you ask) that their sales would improve if they dropped all references to Christmas and just stuck to "Holiday Sales."  This was a big mistake, obviously.  First of all, those who celebrate Christmas, at least in part, because it is the date appointed as the anniversary of the birth of Jesus H. Christ were mortally offended, and immediately struck back with protests and boycotts.  Secondly, sales did not go up because of the misguided effort at "inclusiveness," because people who weren't celebrating "Christmas" weren't planning on buying gifts because of it, and changing to the "Holiday" signage did nothing to change their plans in that respect.

The people who argue that Christmas has morphed into a largely secular holiday have a valid point.  It isn't Jesus who's out there peddling all that merchandise, it's Santa.  And although Santa is, at least nominally, derived from legends of the Christian St. Nicholas, the character that we worship these days is as Pagan as all get-out, what with his magic arts and flying forest animals and Druid-inspired Christmas trees.  Basically, though, the holiday is two holidays, peacefully co-existing for the most part, because the Jesus Nativity story is alive and well and makes everybody feel good, too, albeit in a quieter, less expensive way.

The "holidays," including most especially Christmas, can be tough on people psychologically because sometimes the joy can be hard to come by.  If you're sitting in the dark without power or Christmas movies on TV, if your family is far away and there's no one to feast with, or if you've lost your "Christmas Spirit" and are consumed by doubt and despair, you've also got to contend with the inevitable feelings of guilt that arise when you realize that you are miserable at "the most wonderful time of the year."  Unless you're one of the lucky ones whom Santa comes bounding down the chimney to take on a life-changing sleigh ride or three ghosts undertake to "scare straight," you might feel a little lost.

But there is a cure for that, if you dare to take it.  Struggle into your snow gear, hit the streets and start spreading the cheer yourself.  Walk up to the first person that you meet (if they don't look too dangerous) and wish him or her a "Merry Christmas."  They'll probably say it right back, if only reflexively, and you'll start to feel good.  Repeat as often as necessary as you continue walking to the local liquor store for those Christmas Spirits, and don't spend a lot of time dwelling on the fact that whomever you just "Merry Christmased" might be back there scratching his or her head wondering exactly what you meant by that remark.  It's the "Holidays."  Chillax.

Friendship

Friendship is a mysterious thing.  Sometimes it just sneaks up on you.  Sometimes it’s born out of the smoldering fires of antipathy.  And sometimes it just disappears.

We’ve all had the experience of “like at first sight.”  Some people are naturally attractive to us in the friendship kind of way, as if they were soulmates from some prior bout with existence, happily rediscovered.  (This theory was really big in the late Nineteenth Century.)  But sometimes you really don’t like your friends-to-be at first.  In fact, some people who wind up becoming very good friends start off trying to wring each other’s necks.

Of course, just because you like someone doesn’t mean they’re going to turn out to be your friend.  Sometimes you encounter someone whom you like immediately, want to spend time with, and are sure would be a great friend.  They may even indicate that they feel the same way about you.  But it never really happens, because one or the other of you is just visiting, or is about to move away, or is somebody else’s husband or wife and they don’t like you.

Friendships, like marriages, are often over long before they are ended.  People fall out of friendship just like they fall out of love.  Plus, friendships sometimes wither because of factors beyond the control of the friends themselves, for example when it is necessary for one friend to relocate thousands of miles away.  Children are particularly vulnerable to losing friends this way, because they are in the thrall of adults and don’t usually even get a vote.  But it can happen to adults, too, especially those in the thrall of giant corporations where one must move around to every obscure city in the Heartland (or, these days, Asia)  in order to struggle up the corporate ladder.

Of course, “friendship” is a term subject to interpretation.  Deep down inside, we all know that most of our “friends” are really just “acquaintances,” people we know situationally, like “work friends,” or people with whom we hang out through sheer force of habit  (like more “old friends” than anyone will ever admit.)  Sometimes “acquaintances” can evolve into true “friends,” and sadly the reverse is also true: “friends” can devolve into “acquaintances,” or even simple “pests.”

One can be extremely social, amass a myriad so-called “friends,” and be the loneliest person on earth.  You can “friend” a lot of people on Facebook or keep up a busy social calendar, or bounce from one group activity or social event to the next, without ever spending five minutes of actual one-on-one conversation with anyone in the crowd.  You can be acquainted with someone for years and years, and yet know almost nothing about them.  Mostly, these people, just like you, are only hanging for the company and the noise that keeps them from having to listen to the voices in their own heads.
 

Take a minute and think about it.  Which of your “friends” are irreplaceable?  In fact, aren’t most of your “friends” already replacements for other now-departed “friends”?

Show business “celebrities” talk of almost everyone as their “very good friend.”  Well, come on, it’s a tough business and you never know when you might need somebody’s “friendship.”  But could it possibly be true that someone could have thousands of “really good friends?”  I guess that would depend upon your definition of a “really good friend.”  In Hollywood, the definition has to be pretty loose.  And what about all those smiling diplomats on the news?  I guess that Sly Stone was right:  “Smilin’ faces sometimes pretend to be your friend.”

Which brings us to the subject of “frenemies.”  For various reasons, people sometimes choose to hang out with those they hate.  High school and workplace social hierarchies being what they are, I guess folks sometimes feel they have no choice.  So they paste a shit-eating grin on their carefully plucked and made-up faces and wait for a chance to watch from a front-row seat as their “beloved pal”  gets what they pray is his or her inevitable comeuppance.

A somewhat related scenario occurs with romantic breakups, when one or the other erstwhile partner makes the almost obligatory request to “still be friends.”  Many of these people were never friends to begin with, of course, and in such scenarios the suggestion is just a bad joke.  And if they were friends before they became lovers, becoming lovers probably spoiled the friendship for good.  But sometimes lovers are also friends , and when they are the friendship can sometimes survive the breakup.  This, however, is very rare and mostly happens when the breakup is for larger-than-life reasons, e.g., the breaker-upper woke one morning to realize that he or she was gay all along, or the broken-up-with partner was kidnapped by aliens and presumed dead after seven years.

But all of these observations don’t really get us very close to understanding what a friend is.  If you want to understand that, you have to look at the very rarest category of friend, the “lifelong friend.”  Of course, there are “lifelong acquaintances,” too, but it’s pretty easy to tell the categories apart.  “Lifelong friends” are the ones whom you’re still glad to see when you run into them.

Over the course of twenty years or more, probably the minimum threshold for “lifelong friend” candidacy,  people who have been “friends” all that time will have had their ups and downs, they will have had fights and disagreements and troubles of various sorts in addition to all the rollicking good times.  And if they have remained friends through all of that adversity, they’re probably real friends.

A real friend will lend you money, if you really need it and he or she has got it… at least until the first time that you don’t pay him or her back as agreed.  A real friend will drive you someplace if you ask them, and will agree to be a godparent to your obnoxious child.  A real friend will take your part against the world… but will also tell you if you’re acting like an asshole.  A real friend won’t always tell you the truth, but will have a plausible reason for lying when he or she does.  A real friend will be sorry when you move away or die.

When all is said and done, there is still that mystical, mysterious element to “friendship” for which we really don’t have a good explanation.  (I’d say “pheromones,” but that’s already being used to explain sexual attraction.)  All the above-referenced observations may tell you who is actually your friend, but are they really sufficient to explain why?  Maybe the reincarnation thing has something to it, and it really does take several lifetimes to work up a friendship, just like those Victorian romance writers thought.  But one thing is sure: if you have identified a true friend In your life, or maybe even a few of them, you are fortunate and you should treat the friendship with the respect it deserves.