This Christmas

Christmas is a time when nearly every person in the western world wants to be home with friends and family gathered around. The mental picture of the first Christmas brings a warm scene of Mary holding her newborn to her breast while Joseph looks on. Peering over Mary and Joseph’s shoulders are the animals lodged within the stable. Since that first Christmas, that feeling is what we all strive for. Friendship, the communal sense of family and of belonging, these are what make Christmas, Christmas. The presents, the food and the never-ending carols are all simply additional window dressing.

This Christmas is the first where I am the oldest living member of my family. It is a strange and rather lonely feeling being the “older generation”. Let’s face it, people of my age were the generation that brought along tie dye, long hair, patchouli oil masquerading as hippie perfume, and the free-form twitching we called dancing. We are the generation that vowed to never grow old and to never trust anyone over thirty. Now, I have socks older than thirty and underwear that qualifies for AARP. But I have never lost my love of Christmas.

Some folks consider only the gifts where Christmas is concerned; the larger, the more elaborate and expensive the gift, the better the Christmas. All right, let’s consider that criteria: The first Christmas present wasn’t gold, frankincense, or myrrh, it was far more valuable. The creator of the universe, the one who stands outside of time and space and envisioned the utter incomprehensible complexity of the web of life, stepped out of heaven and entered base humanity as a helpless baby, and not just a baby, but one born to a family on the poor side of the tracks. The reason for that gift comes along every Easter.

This Christmas is especially poignant for me, and not just because of the reason I mentioned earlier. For the past few months I’ve been dealing with a progressive numbness that began with my toes and now extends upwards to my hips. Because of a family history, I was worried about the possibility of MS or even cancer, but that turned out to be a needless fear. It seems my body doesn’t metabolize all those B12 vitamins I’ve been taking all these years. The result is the formation of an inflammation within the cervical spinal cord similar to that caused by Transverse myelitis. The difference being that this form doesn’t come along with the agonizing pain of the other. Treatment is a course of steroids over a period of three days and several B12 shots.

So, I get to spend the three days after Christmas in the hospital. If any one wants to visit, I’ll be in the St. Rose facility off 125 and Eastern just outside of Anthem. Just be forewarned, I’ll be a highlands Celt on steroids.