We were learning Christmas carols and had been talking about the words and how they related to the Christmas story. I was inclined to agree with her at that point. Having just returned from a trip to the Church, where the questions got a little tricky I had been thinking about the whole birth story.
"How did the baby get into her tummy?" a child had asked.
The vicar laughed and neatly side-stepped the question.
"They kissed. I bet they did," said another wiser child.
"How did the baby get out?" asked another.
"Pretty much the same way you did," I suggested.
"But they weren't in a hospital," the child protested.
Then they were back to the question of conception. A very enthusiastic church helper tried to answer their questions. She told them that Joseph was much older.
"How old was Mary?," they asked.
"They think she was about eleven," the woman told them.
There was a shocked holding of breath while these year two children processed the fact that someone in year six could have a baby.
"So, how did the baby get into her tummy?"
My year six pupil had looked up the word 'undefiled' in the dictionary (Zither Carol).
"It means she wasn't raped, doesn't it? I mean, how gross. When you think about where you sing, 'veiled in flesh the god head see,' in Hark the Herald and, 'Lo, he abhors not the virgin's womb.' Well. It's just disgusting. Do they really need to over-share?"
I praised her for her dictionary skills and suggested she didn't think about it too much, that we use words differently now and how it was such a long time ago we will never really know what happened.
Despite all this, I'm not put off. I still like the Christian Christmas story. It's a story of hope and tolerance. A story where someone who is displaced from their home can give birth to a person who will change the world.
I'm not ashamed to say that I love Christmas. I love the paganess of it. I love the rituals that help us over the short dadays. I love cutting plants down and bringing them indoors to slowly die, reminding ourselves that things still grow even when it's cold and dark. I love adding lights to things and burning candles, just to help us forget that the days are so short. This year we have lights everywhere and have two real Christmas trees. The Long Suffering Husband and I couldn't agree. I like the tree in the hall, beautifully, classily decorated, so that you get a whiff of pine as you walk in and that everyone who comes to the house says, "Oooh, I love your tree. Gold. So classy." The LSH says it doesn't feel like Christmas unless the tree is in the living room. Last year, he won and I missed the admiring comments about my lovely tree, so it was my turn. As a compromise I trimmed some branches off the bottom and made Beecher's Brook on the mantle piece, while he found the Christmas tree stand.
"It's broken. We'll have to get a new one," he shouted down from the loft hatch. We could get another tree for the living room while we're there."
I've been so excited about my two trees. It feels very naughty, decadent; wasteful, even but I don't care.
"Will you be letting him decorate his own tree?" my mum asked.
"Don't be silly," I said. How could she have forgotten that I suffer from COD? It's like OCD but only at Christmas (Christmas Obsessive Disorder).
I love the pagan tradition of stuffing yourself with fat, nuts and berries to see you through a long cold winter. I make my pudding and cake in November (decorate it on Christmas Eve). I'm even happy to blend in a Thanksgiving tradition and eat turkey and I'll let other commercial enterprises get in on the act. Advent is all about chocolate because we are feeding ourselves up for a long winter.
I love giving presents. I love buying things for people and hoping they'll like them. I love wrapping them, in apaper that matches the tree with added bows and ribbons (see COD). Even my difficulty buying for the LSH, which you will know about if you've read other blogs, would never stop me trying. I love the excitement of gift exchanges. Sometimes the wrapping is better than the present and I think I would just be happy with boxes. I'm trying that theory out on the LSH this year.
I love Father Christmas or whatever you call him. The idea of a spirit that travels the sky in midwinter bringing gifts to children is just marvellous. I love the way that traditions from all around the world get smushed together to make something brilliant. I love to track him on NORAD and love that scientists and mathematicians are happy to believe.
I love that Christmas is a time for belief. The major Christian festival (after Easter) has used these pagan traditions to enhance its own celebration. At Christmas, you can believe anything.
I love singing. Christmas is a time for song. It's the time of year when you can play songs like, "I wanna go skating with Willie, 'cause Willie is such a good skate." or "I'm a little Christmas cracker, bang-a-bang-a-bang-a that's me." You can shout/sing 12 days of Christmas. You can listen to beautiful choral music and sing Christmas carols, belting out a solo of the descant verse.
I love the traditions that each family develops. Our family takes a trip to London to see the lights, browse the food halls and enjoy the hustle bustle of the city. This year it will be just the LSH and me but we are undeterred. This is one tradition we are never giving up. I put on my Christmas jumper and the LSH laughed.
"It's a Christmas jumper kind of day," I told him, bouncing up and down excitedly, "I bloody love Christmas, I do."
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