Traditions

The winding down of the holidays doesn’t involve the same excitement as the run up to them.  The ornaments are packed away, the tree will soon be on the curb for the Boy Scouts to cart away.  But it’s a great time to reflect, and there’s the excitement for what the new year will bring.  It started when I was working fulltime, but Monday is still my favorite day of the week, as it holds the promise of things yet to come.

We enjoy a number of Christmas traditions in our house, some from before Francie and I were married over 42 years ago, and some more recent since we moved to Bend 7 years ago.  One of our more recent customs is getting a $5 permit and cutting down our own Christmas tree in the forest.  We go with friends and make a morning of it.  The trees, being ‘free range’, don’t look like their polished, symmetrical cousins at the tree lots in town.  They have a lot more character, and are super fresh.  The one we got this year had plenty of room for ornaments, sturdy boughs for the heavier ornaments, and was so fresh that even as I write this weeks later, it has not dropped a single needle.

Foods are definitely part of the holiday tradition.  Francie makes orange rolls that her mother made when Francie was young.  I used to make stolen, a German Christmas bread, which my mom always baked around Christmas.  When our son Brian became vegan, I got a recipe for a cashew nut roast with mushroom-sherry gravy from co-worker Terie Rowley at the City of Carlsbad, and it has been a crowd-pleasing fixture at holiday feasts for almost 20 years.

The ornaments are a tradition in themselves.  Decorating the tree is a trip of memories, remembering who made the ornaments, or where we bought them.  We have the Kliban cat ornament that we bought at Mervyns before we were even married.  We have the beloved vase made by Francie in second grade from an orange juice can covered with plaster and glitter (although the accompanying plastic rose seems to be currently MIA).

Sometimes the provenance of the ornament is lost in time.  Probably my all-time favorite ornament is the mouse in a matchbox bed.  I can’t tell you why it’s my favorite, it just makes me smile.  It’s somewhat delicate, and has been glued together multiple times.  Between Christmases, it now lives in a special small box to protect it from damage in the crate of ornaments.  The back of the ornament is inscribed with “KB ‘97”.  A search through my contacts reveals 7 entries with the initials KB, but none from that period that make sense.

I hope you have traditions that bring you as much joy as the ‘mouse in a matchbox’ bring to me.  And if not, or even if you do, consider starting a new tradition.  You can try them out, and see if they stick.