It is early this Christmas morning and, as is my habit, I am awake long before the others enjoying the quiet and the anticipation. Strangely, in a time of shared and extended family, this is the time of Christmas I like best. I can anticipate the day, the family games, the pleasure that I hope my gifts to the others will bring and, mostly, the thoughts of my family and my friends across the country in various stages of Christmas awakening.
Despite our continued snowfall, my youngest son and his girl friend are in residence and we enjoyed last evening together watching a Christmas movie. We did everything one expects on the eve of this holiday – cheese, crackers and sausage in the afternoon, a Christmas movie, dinner and desert, and conversation. Nothing remarkable in the sense of tradition, but satisfying and of substance, nonetheless.
I wish for many things each Christmas morning, some personal and some not. I suppose that much of what I wish for – peace, sanity, and food, health and security for all – will not likely come true in a society composed of flawed humanity. But, in any event, I can wish for these things in the considered hope that more of us do so each year than last. If I am incorrect in this hopeful assumption, I don’t wish my belief to be shattered or diminished – not on Christmas morning anyway.
This is not intended as a sectarian thought, and my use of the word “sectarian” is not meant to be limited to the many varieties of Christians in the world. My usage is an attempt to encompass all beliefs about the existence of mankind and its condition of being – including those which are religious, those which are scientific, and those which are mixed or neither. All of conscious humanity has some sense of the wonder of our place in a firmament which is vastly greater than that which we can know. All of us wonder why we exist and what our shared purpose, if any, may be. It is as much a part of the human condition to wonder about these things, as it is to want to be with family in the deep midwinter.
As the ease of communication among our species expands, it seems likely that many of the barriers created by our genetic suspicion of differences will be overcome. I have long felt that we are hardwired to be suspicious of those who look and act differently from the society with which we are accustomed. It is my firm hope that because of the increased ease of information sharing we will learn to put aside these suspicions and, instead, celebrate the differences of humanity’s opinion, ceremony and beliefs in recognition of the many ways in which humanity has discovered to travel the distance from birth to death. The ingenuity of mankind’s many methods of living a life deserves no less than such celebration.
Such are the thoughts of my Christmas morning as the world is slowly coming awake and the sharing begins.
