Flashlight and iPhone Case

Day 262: Flashlight and iPhone Case
Christmas season. I had planned to take care of at least a couple weeks of the stuff project by getting rid of lots of unwanted Christmas junk. It turns out I have none to get rid of.

Awwww

There's a lot written about Christmas. A lot of mixed feelings about the holidays. The objections to it:

1. The holidays create pressure to feel happy. It highlights the feeling of alienation for those who aren't. Suicide rates spike before Christmas and Thanksgiving.
2. Christmas takes over our society, but not everyone celebrates it. It's exclusionary, yet all-encompassing.
3. Christmas is commercialized. It causes people to purchase unneeded things, which has an environmental impact. People feel pressure around gift-giving; it's stressful and overwhelming. It's no fun. People spend more money than they can afford, causing financial hardship.

A souvenir of one of my many
trips to Mexico. A teeny tiny nativity.

All this is true, and yet, I like Christmas. I always have. It's not a religious thing for me. I just like the smell of pine and hot chocolate. I like the sparkling colored lights on these darkest of days, like our own little constellations. I like the silly ritual of stocking stuffers, Tic Tacs and chocolate geld, socks and ear buds and chewing gum. I like doing jigsaw puzzles instead of checking email, eating Jane's fudge and decorating her plastic tree. I like all our Christmas ornaments: the ones my kids made, the ones I made as a kid, the ones my mother used as a kid, the ones that include adorably retro second grade school photos. I like singing Christmas carols, although, like my mother before me, I had a secular upbringing. It's a lovely story, but I don't believe in the miracle birth.

A sawed off clothes pin in a felt suit
with a Magic Marker smile. We
made them from a Good Housekeeping
pattern when I was a kid

I was delighted, as a college freshman, to learn in my Celtic culture and mythology class that the December festival of lights predates Christianity. It felt like permission to celebrate Christmas. Now that I'm a little (a lot) older, I don't need permission. Christmas can be just a simple uncomplicated ritual in a world that lacks ritual. No need for justification.

People all over the world, of many faiths, believe - deeply and absolutely - that their own faith is true. People all over the world believe - deeply and absolutely - that other faiths are false. People bomb abortion clinics and run airplanes into buildings for this reason. I myself have no early religious training that would dispose me to believe one faith over another. Nothing to slant me toward Confucionism over Christianity. No bias toward Buddhism, Bahai or Zoroastrianism. No reason to favor the Shintos over the Siekhs. Of course, this isn't entirely true; I'm certainly more familiar with Christianity and Judaism because of the accident of my culture and surroundings. But close enough.

Christmas mouse from my
mother's childhood tree

Awwww

I do believe in kindness, and helping others, and doing the right thing. I believe that most people behave morally even without threat of external punishment or promise of reward: people do what's right because it's the right thing to do. If God is a conscious and separate entity, then God must at least be the moral equal of humanity. Therefore, I believe - but I don't know - that I won't be punished for choosing wrong. If it turns out that the Mahayana Buddhists are the ones who got it right, then I guess I'll be all right. If it's the Church of Christ, I guess I'm in trouble - along with everybody else in the world who got born in the wrong place at the wrong time. I have no more interest in a god who excludes Jews and others than I have in a country club that does the same.

I can part with this half-working
flashlight and iPod case

I guess I'm like most other folks who believe what their mothers believe. In the words of my own mother: "Love me or else. Not."