Finding the reason for the season
"Are you ready for Christmas yet?"
These are the words that strike fear in the hearts of procrastinators like myself. They hit me with the same feeling I get listening to fingernails scrape across a chalkboard.
Those who inquire about such holiday preparedness are generally a little smug. They're the ones who do their Christmas shopping during the post-holiday sales and have the luxury of sending all of their packages by the slowest form of snail mail because they're so darn organized.
As of this moment, I've not written one Christmas card or sent any packages that need to get faraway places such as Connecticut within the next seven days. But with a little help from various express shipping devices, I should be OK.
I know it's in vogue to downsize and simplify Christmas, but I've found it difficult to shave very much off my to-do list this time of year. I enjoy buying gifts for family members, and how can you not decorate the house in red and green from one end to the other? And once you've established the time-honored tradition of baking Christmas cookies, it's hard to make the switch to stale store-bought pastries.
Christmas cards are a chore I complete with an admitted ulterior motive. If I don't send cards, I'll be crossed off other people's lists, and I won't get to find out how my cousin's day lilies are doing in Florida, or how many cruises my high school girlfriends have been on this year. I wouldn't be subjected to the details of Aunt May's bladder surgery or the annual letter from one family that's written from the dog's point of view.
On second thought, greeting cards may be one item I can safely cross off the list.
What keeps me going amid all the overt holiday preparations are the special moments each year when the spirit of Christmas - the reason for the season - shows itself in unexpected ways.
During one exhaustive Christmas season about 15 years ago, I attended the Christmas party at the Montana Veterans Home in Columbia Falls to take photographs and write a story. As I sat there waiting for the "action" to happen, I noticed two old soldiers interacting. One of the men was unable to feed himself, so his friend quietly and tenderly fed him spoonfuls of pie.
It was in that very moment I realized the spirit of Christmas was alive and well, not in the gaudy display of Santa Claus arriving to greet a crowd of veterans, but in the unseen act of one man helping another.
Since then, I've made a conscious effort to look for those small acts of kindness or moments of clarity, especially during the holiday season when life's a blur and we all need a little reminder that Christmas is more than presents and decorations.
"Are you ready for Christmas?"
It's a loaded question. As a Christian, I look forward to celebrating the birth of Christ. As a human being, I struggle with all of the obligations that can easily overshadow this most important holiday.
What I do know is that Christmas, and Christ, will come, whether we're ready or not.
Features editor Lynnette Hintze may be reached at 758-4421 or by e-mail at lhintze@dailyinterlake.com