Yes, it all has to go back in the boxes, back in the basement. Sigh. Like Scrooge I will endeavour to “honour Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year. I will live in the Past, the Present, and the Future. The Spirits of all Three shall strive within me. I will not shut out the lessons that they teach.”
The two books I raved about all year and wanted to hand out to people like candy were Karl Marlantes’s fabulous
and Hilary Mantel’s
I haven’t read anything better than these two books in ages. Yes, Matterhorn is a war novel and, yes, it’s unpleasant, but why shouldn’t it be? This book goes way beyond the typical war story; it is wonderfully nuanced and manages to give every point of view. As for Wolf Hall, well, my dual personality introduced me to it (for which I am very grateful) so I don’t have to go into great detail about why it’s wonderful. As I blogged earlier, the book made me love Thomas Cromwell!
Honorable mentions go to two re-reads:
A favorite of mine since middle school, T.E. Lawrence’s
and a more recent find that I just keep going back to, Alistair MacLeod’s lyrical and elegaic
What were your favorite books of 2011?
As 2011 comes to a close and we consider all the things we are grateful for (including our wonderful siblings), I’d like to put in a word for church. I’ve never been much of a joiner, but over the last year I’ve not only started going to church — the first Presbyterian Church in Canton — but I was moved to become a member. It has made a big difference in my life. Everyone there is so happy and so friendly; Sundays always help me face the week among my judgmental colleagues. Going to church has reminded me of all the things that are important. May you all find such a home!
Siblings are one of our greatest gifts. Take a moment to be thankful for yours if you are lucky enough to have one or two. As the Rt. Rev. Desmond Tutu said, “You don’t choose your family. They are God’s gift to you, as you are to them.”
Too many scrumptious holiday meals and a party (with leftovers) to boot.
Mea culpa. Oy.
Daughter #2 made her special blueberry coffee cake. Yum. Daughter #1 made Pillsbury cinnamon rolls. Yum. Diet Coke, coffee. Perfect. Mimosas following.
A family favorite to read on Christmas Eve was always the great scene from Geoffrey Willens, How to be Topp:
Another thing about xmas eve is that your pater always reads the xmas carol by c. dickens. You canot stop this aktualy although he pretend to ask you whether you would like it. He sa:
Would you like me to read the xmas carol as it is xmas eve, boys?
We are listening to the space serial on the wireless, daddy.
But you canot prefer that nonsense to the classick c. dickens?
Be quiet. He is out of control and heading for jupiter.
But —
He’s had it the treen space ships are ataking him ur-ur-ur-whoosh. Out of control limping in the space vacuum for evermore unless they can get the gastric fuel compressor tampons open.
I —
Why don’t they try Earth on the intercom? They will never open those tampons with only a z-ray griper. They will —
Father thwarted strike both boys heavily with loaded xmas stoking and tie their hands behind their backs. He cart them senseless into the sitting room and prop both on his knees. Then he begin:
He rub hands together and sa You will enjoy this boys it is all about ghosts and goodwill. It is tip-top stuff and there is an old man called scrooge who hates xmas and canot understand why everyone is so mery. To this you sa nothing except that scrooge is your favourite character in fiction next to tarzan of the apes. But you can sa anything chiz. Nothing in the world in space is ever going to stop those fatal words:
Marley was dead.
Personaly i do not care a d. whether Marley was dead or not it is just that there is something about the xmas Carol which makes paters and grown-ups read with grate XPRESION, and this is very embarassing for all. It is all right for the first part they just roll the r’s a lot but wate till they come to scrooge’s nephew. When he sa Mery Christmas uncle it is like an H-bomb xplosion and so it go on until you get to Tiny Tim chiz chiz chiz he is a weed. When Tiny Tim sa God bless us every one your pater is so overcome he burst out blubbing. By this time boys hav bitten through their ropes and make good their escape so 9000000000 boos to bob cratchit.
We also read aloud from Kenneth Graham’s Birdy’s Christmas, which is equally wonderful. What am I forgetting? What do you read?
Could that be ANCIII (our Scrooge-y pater whose favorite yuletide expression was Bah Humbug) dressed up as Santa? No way, dude. But, yes, there he is bringing gifts to fun-loving, guitar-playing M.I. girls from the American Field Service Club in 1965. How did they ever prevail upon him to appear in public like that? Thank goodness some Polaroid-carrying party-goer snapped this once-in-a-lifetime moment for posterity. Good times.
“Away in a Manger” is a Christmas carol first published in an Evangelical Lutheran Sunday School collection, Little Children’s Book for Schools and Families in 1885 in Philadelphia and used widely throughout the English-speaking world. For many years the text was credited to the great German reformer Martin Luther because in the book Dainty Songs for Little Lads and Lasses (1887) it bore the title “Luther’s Cradle Hymn” and the note, “Composed by Martin Luther for his children, and still sung by German mothers to their little ones.” This is pretty much accepted as not the case, but it is nice to think so.
Luther was, after all, a prolific hymn writer, authoring many important hymns including Ein feste Burg ist unser Gott (A Mighty Fortress Is Our God), based on Psalm 46. And Luther was a married man and the father of six children. He married Katharina von Bora, one of 12 nuns he had helped escape from the Nimbschen Cistercian convent in April 1523, and we are led to believe he never regretted it. Luther confided to Michael Stiefel on 11 August 1526: “My Katie is in all things so obliging and pleasing to me that I would not exchange my poverty for the riches of Croesus.” Would that all husbands felt this way.
Anyway, it is one of my favorite Christmas carols, expressing in a wonderful childlike way, the bottom line of Christmas: God incarnate.
Away in a manger,
No crib for His bed
The little Lord Jesus
Laid down His sweet headThe stars in the bright sky
Looked down where He lay
The little Lord Jesus
Asleep on the hayThe cattle are lowing
The poor Baby wakes
But little Lord Jesus
No crying He makesI love Thee, Lord Jesus
Look down from the sky
And stay by my side,
‘Til morning is nigh.Be near me, Lord Jesus,
I ask Thee to stay
Close by me forever
And love me I prayBless all the dear children
In Thy tender care
And take us to heaven
To live with Thee there
dual personalities 