Here’s a big shout out to everyone out there brightening our world and spirits with your beautiful Christmas lights.
This may even provide enough inspiration to put up some of my own lights one of these years — but I see no reason to rush into anything. Wouldn’t want to peak too early.
The work some people go to, and the expense, is amazing. And like so many of you, I’m not only glad, but so appreciative they do it. Especially in a year as dark as this one has been. The many cheerful, colourful and creative lighting displays throughout our cities and towns have definitely warmed our collective hearts.
They also rekindle fond memories. My dad, Joe Mustard, was Mr. Christmas. I went with him many times to pick up a tree and he was very particular about which one to bring home.
Dad would pick through one after another, looking for at least a couple of essential features.
The base had to be long enough to go in the stand without having to cut off any big branches, and the branches themselves had to fill out the tree in a very balanced manner, for both appearance and hanging the tinsel and lights properly.
Once Dad had the lights meticulously strung to his satisfaction, and the angel placed at the top, we’d all hang ornaments and tinsel. The more tinsel, the shinier that tree got. A tree without tinsel looked naked. Barren. No shimmer or glimmer. Blasphemy. And it was no throw away society back in those days. Dad was nothing if not practical, and before that tree left the house after Christmas, all the tinsel was removed and neatly put away for next year’s tree. Waste not — want not.
The scent from any Christmas tree always triggers decades of fabulous family memories. Maybe that’s why I like those magnificent Rocky Mountains so much.
Of course those memories include endless family gatherings, which we’re going to have to hold off on for the most part this time around — but I have an idea that may allow those get-togethers to happen regardless. Just in a different form.
Yes, it’s time for our first, and hopefully only Social Media Christmas!
A lot of us have photo albums and video footage in one form or another of Christmas and New Year celebrations gone by, and this is the year to dig them up and share the heck out of them.
There are surely a gazillion pics and videos to call up and share with those you care about, and now’s the time to open the old photo albums, scan the pics or even just take a photo of them with your phone and send them along to friends and family. The fun feedback and memories shared will bring joy to your world.
You don’t have to be face to face to share emotions.
Also, VERY important, text less and talk more. Video chat as much as possible, walk around and do virtual tours of your home, family activities, and even have a video chat or two while you’re out walking the dog, or cross country skiing.
To get back to what inspired this festive diatribe today, go Christmas light cruising either on foot or by car and share the sights you’re enjoying by whatever electronic means available.
Who knows what you’ll find going through all that old Christmas history so many of us still have tucked somewhere around our homes.
Thanks to all the Christmas decorations that have been handed down through the family, I may actually have a piece or two of the tinsel my father saved all those years ago. What a find that would be. Let the search begin.
Best of the season to one and to all!
Comments and feedback welcome!
lmustard1948@gmail.com
