The Twelve Days of Christmas Tide.
Most know of the refrain "and a partridge in a pear tree", and most of us can name a few of the the other gifts that "my true love gave to me" in this medieval counting (or beer tavern) song; there are of course 5 Golden Rings, 7 Swans a swimming and something about 10 or 11 Lepers Leaping. But other than existing in the oft parodied 12 Days of Christmas song, those 12 days have been truncated or flat out lost. I think judging by the American retailer, the 12 Days of Christmas are now recognizable as beginning the day after Halloween, and by 12 Days, we use the number 12 only metaphorically to mean "54 shopping days left until Christmas".
Hearkening back to the liturgical calendar, those 12 Days of Christmas actually began with Christ's Mass on December 25 and lasted until the season of Epiphany on January 7. So, Christmas in days of yore lasted until January 6. But in these fast times, which of us attention deficit ridden consumers has time to loll about for 12 days AFTER Christmas? I have heard more than one person reason that is so depressing to have Christmas decorations up as they tread the verge of the New Year. Dismantle the tree post-haste! Those stocking hung with care in hopes that St. Nick would soon be there? - Hey Lady! If you haven't noticed, St. Nick has already come and gone, put those socks in a cedar box, just get 'em out here. Why, now there are 54 college football bowl games scheduled for our viewing pleasure. What casual fan of sport would not rue missing the Delaware Blue Hens vs. The Eastern Washington Eagles at Pizza Hut Park - Pluck the Hens! Pluck the Eagles! The opposing partisan chants rise from within the stadium. In Texas there are black-eyed peas to cook (for good luck - only if eaten on New Year's Day). With all of these events and obligations stuffed into the end-of-the year, can we really afford to keep Christmas around for 12 whole days? Obviously not, Christmas trappings past impinge too much upon of the shiny and fascinating coming New Year, The Next Big Thing. We are so done with Christmas by the 27th of December. And have you noticed it is getting harder and harder to find Guy Lombardo and his Band of Royal Canadiens playing Auld Lang Syne on TV.
Should old times be forgot?
Should we not hurry up an move on to the next disposable calendar day, checking off each appointment and feeling the due satisfaction of attending another meeting as a measure of our worth? I'll take up the mantle of iconoclast to this postmodern culture, in a small way I'll still mark the 12 Days of Christmas. I'll hold onto a slower world. I'll continue to light the Christmas lights until January 6, while the rest of the neighborhood once so brightly lit in anticipation of Christmas has now quickly dimmed into ordinary winter darkness post 12/25.
And in this 2010-2011 season, a new effort on my part. I syncritzed the 12 Days of Christmas with the spirit of the 8 days of Jewish Hanukkah in the effort to make "it" last. This year it is a race to the bottom of the bottle, Eggnog vs. Hennessy Cognac. Could I make the winter's evening eggnog supply last all the way to Epiphany or would I run out of cognac prematurely and have to take the eggnog straight? Of course the cognac had a head start, being a partially drained bottle that was a legacy from my Grandfather who passed away in 1976. The less-than-full cognac bottle sitting on my shelf for the past + 32 years was rediscovered in November when a tiramisu cake recipe called for cognac.
Each evening, in a comfortable chair across the low-lit room from the strands of diminutive colored lights entwined on the boughs of our live Christmas Tree, I sip a tumbler of eggnog and cognac. I reflect on blessing, friends and kindness. I raise my glass and take this, a cup of kindness.
There is a season for everything; a season for eggnog and a season for evergreen trees inside the home. It is foolish to hold too tight to old times and yet reckless to deny a full measure to each season as it comes. Sure enough, I am out of eggnog, and there remains not much more than a few tablespoons and vapors in the cognac bottle. But to each in its own own season all will be drained, whether it is cognac or the hourglass holding the sands of time. Sip and savor each cup of kindness offered and drink among your dears until it is at last drained dry. As I embrace the New Year this is my Epiphany.
For auld lang syne, my dear,
for auld lang syne,
we'll take a cup of kindness yet,
for auld lang syne.
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