Christmas: Family, Lights, and a Little Weirdness

This week I started writing about a holiday visit from family up in North Dakota. By Friday afternoon I was looking at depression and a prayer:

• Good Times, Good Visit
• Mass in Minnesota: Freezing Fog and Celebrating Anyway
  • Babies and Expectations
• Holiday Weirdness
• Meanwhile, at Our House
  • Two Incidents After Mass
• Desolation, Dissatisfaction, Depression, and a Prayer

Good Times, Good Visit

I’ve been thoroughly enjoying this Christmas season.

Number-two daughter, son-in-law, and granddaughter were here last weekend for part of a day, the night, and part of the next day.

We stood and talked. We sat and talked. Then we slept, and did more of the same the next day. Somewhere along the line we exchanged presents. Granddaughter and I watched a few episodes of “Shaun the Sheep”. The latter is a must-do, and has been since rather early on.

Our Christmas get-togethers are on a vastly smaller scale than those held by Aunt Jule and Uncle George. I talked about those family feasts last month.

Our house isn’t quite as big as theirs, which is a story for another time. Besides, my wife and I aren’t Aunt Jule and Uncle George. We do and enjoy what we can. What we can’t — we don’t.

We’re not all alike. That’s okay. We’re not supposed to be all alike, which is also okay. And that’s another topic.

Mass in Minnesota: Freezing Fog and Celebrating Anyway

I’d been planning on getting to the Christmas morning Mass at our parish.

Number-three daughter came to my desk Tuesday, pointing out that freezing fog and/or drizzle was in the forecast. And, on a more practical note, she wondered if I’d prefer getting to the Christmas Eve Mass. She had a valid point.

Freezing fog and/or drizzle isn’t a problem by itself, aside from being cold and restricting visibility. When it lubricates streets and sidewalks: that’s a problem. Particularly for someone with my pedal dexterity.

So I decided, finally, that not risking a fall made sense. Then I asked about shuffling my/our eating schedules, had an early evening meal, and got to the Christmas Eve Mass about 40 minutes ahead of time.

I found an empty parking spot only a block from Our Lady of the Angels. Which, for Christmas Eve, is doing pretty well. If I have to do this another year, I’ll try getting there an hour early. As for this year’s one-block walk, I’ll regard it as extra exercise for the day.

Babies and Expectations

For me, Christmas is a big deal: and one of our holy days of obligation. Those are days when we’re expected to be at Mass. Unless I’ve got good reason for not being there.

Good reasons include but are not limited to being sick, or being obliged to care for an infant who can’t be brought to church. (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2181)

Just having a baby in the house doesn’t mean not going to Mass, by the way. I can count on hearing an infant or two almost every Sunday.

On the other hand, the small one behind me Tuesday night slept through everything. The older sister didn’t, and that’s yet another topic.

Or maybe not so much. I really don’t mind hearing that we’ve got families among us. With kids who have good, strong lungs.

One more thing about holy days of obligation.

As a Catholic, I’m expected to be at Mass. But if I’m not there, the immediate consequences are missing out on Mass that day: period.

That said, if I skip Mass on purpose, because I don’t feel like it or whatever — I’ve already got problems that need attention. And that’s a whole mess of additional topics.

As it is, I like Christmas (Eve, for me, this year, which counts as Christmas Day — it’s complicated).

I’ll try that again.

As it is, I like our Christmas Mass. The music. The people — individuals and families. That whacking great evergreen behind the altar, covered with lights. And being there to celebrate, worship, and receive our Lord.

Since it’s Christmas, we’re celebrating our Lord’s birth.

It’s a pretty big deal. I’ve talked about this before. There’ll be links near the end of this post.¹

Holiday Weirdness

Sauk Centre is a very ‘Catholic’ town. But we’re also a town in America.

Folks living in the next block north of our house have inflatable yard decorations out and lit up for this Christmas season. So, on my way to Mass, I drove by Baby Yoda and SpongeBob SquarePants wearing a festive Santa hat.²

Baby Yoda is holding what I’m pretty sure is an orange Halloween treat bag.

Meanwhile, on our block, one of our neighbors has set up a huge wire mesh snowman covered with tiny white lights, and sporting orange lights on its mesh-carrot nose. I haven’t measured it, but I’m guessing the thing’s some 15-16 feet tall.

How they disassemble and store it, I have no idea. But they’ve had it spreading cheer along this side of the street for a few years now: so obviously they have their methods.

Another neighbor, across the street, has a more traditional monochrome array of red lights across their home’s front. Elsewhere in town I’ve seen assorted manger scenes and colored lights on display.

With or without a Santa hat, I don’t see anything particularly Christmassy about SpongeBob SquarePants. Apart from that look of indefatigable cheerfulness.

But that household’s yard decorations are nice and colorful. Plus, between Spongebob’s hat and Grogu’s complexion, they’re adding this culture’s traditional red and green colors to their part of the street.

Make that lighting their part of the street. Grogu and SpongeBob glow in the dark. Brightly. I suppose I could indulge in virtue signaling by denouncing that effort to cheer up our midwinter.

But — no. There’s enough screed shrieking around already. Far too much. Besides, I like how they help light up these long winter nights.

Meanwhile, at Our House

This household has nothing outside for Christmas this year. We’ve none of us been particularly well.

But my son set up our Christmas tree in the living room. Along with shepherds, sheep, angels and the stable/creche scene. Number-three daughter put those three “JOY” snowmen on the keyboard.

My son also set up our Advent calendar. It’s one of those fold-up card stock things, unfolding into a Dickensian Christmas scene — showing old-fashioned shops, anyway — Christmas Carol, post-ghost, Dickensian; where everybody’s cheerful.

That reminds me —

Two Incidents After Mass

I’d been moving toward the back of the church Christmas Eve, when someone came up, expressing hope that what she said wouldn’t be offensive. Then she asked if I’d like her to get my car.

That wasn’t an offense, that was an offer, and I said so. She’d seen me walking toward church, and made not-inaccurate assumptions about my mobility.

Thanks and the keys followed, with her assurance that she wasn’t a car thief — which wasn’t a big concern for me.

For one thing, this is Sauk Centre: we’re not exactly a high-crime area. For another, if she did abscond with the rusting hulk of a van we have, the consequences for her would be much more serious than for me and the household.

Her words and my assumption matched reality. She drove up with the van, returned the keys and began looking for her husband. I drove back to a very pleasant Christmas Eve evening with my wife, son, and number-three daughter.

Before I wrap this up, a conversation between a couple guys after Mass, outside the church, last Sunday:

“Any words of wisdom?”

“The girls are the brains, I’m just getting the truck.”

Looks like I’m not the only one who feels that way. Sometimes, at least.

Desolation, Dissatisfaction, Depression, and a Prayer

Again, I’ve been thoroughly enjoying this Christmas season.

But this is also a bad time of year for me. That’s probably due in part to something that happened when I was 12.

“…my mother had a severe stroke. I’m told that I was with her at the time, and accompanied her in an ambulance. My father tells me that he blamed me. That’s understandable. Dealing with me can be stressful….”
(“Ritalin, the 2020 Summer Olympics, and Me” > Delayed Diagnosis (August 7, 2021))

The point is that I’ve been dealing with depression at least since I was 12, and didn’t get diagnosed until I was living here in Sauk Centre.

That — and an intercessory prayer chain giving me a couple ‘pray about this’ items for specific individuals dealing with depression — finally prodded me into looking for appropriate prayers.

I found this:

“O Christ Jesus
When all is darkness
And we feel our weakness and helplessness,
Give us the sense of Your Presence,
Your Love and Your Strength.
Help us to have perfect trust
In Your protecting love
And strengthening power,
So that nothing may frighten or worry us,
For, living close to You,
We shall see Your Hand,
Your Purpose,
Your Will through all things.
Amen.”
(From St. Ignatius of Loyola’s Prayer Against Depression, Catholic Diocese of St. Petersburg, Florida)

Saint Ignatius of Loyola isn’t one of those storybook saints, with the inhuman buoyancy of SpongeBob Squarepants, but without the cartoon character’s brooding intellect.

On his way to becoming a Saint, he went through a really rough patch.

I can see how folks might miss that facet of his life, though. Wikipedia ‘s Ignatius of Loyola page mentions his experience with “desolation and dissatisfaction” in a single sentence before moving on to joy, peace, and the rest of his life.³

I’ve talked about Saints, holiday celebrations, and why Christmas matters, before.

This time around, I’ve organized and labeled the links:

• Midwinter fun and festivities
  • “Christmas With Aunt Jule and Uncle George” (November 30, 2024)
    • Julekake and Lefse, Krumkake and Sandbakelse, But No Lutefisk
  • “Victorian Christmas Cards, Holiday Weirdness” (December 24, 2022)
    • Christmas and New Year’s Eve: a Double-Header Solstice Celebration
• Mass and Christmas
  • “Olympic Opening Ceremonies: ‘Saddened by Certain Scenes’” (August 5, 2024)
    • The Last Supper: It’s a Big Deal
  • “‘Christmas Sermon for Pagans’: Viewpoints, Nature; and Hope” (December 23, 2023)
    • “…Sing and Feast Because a God has Been Born….
• Depression and Life
  • “Saints, Depression, Assumptions, and Me” (March 23, 2024)
    • Depression, Faith, and Making Decisions
    • Teresa of Ávila: Mystic and Troublemaker
    • João Duarte Cidade, AKA Saint John of God
    • Saint Benedict Joseph Labre
    • Poverty, Terminal Illness, and Ham Sandwiches
  • “Miscarriage, Stillbirth, and Hope” (October 9, 2016)
    • Miscarriage: Joy
    • Stillbirth: Elizabeth
    • ‘Why be miserable?’

¹ Christmas — glitz, lights; and a truly epic event:

• “Advent 2022: Remembering the Big Picture” (December 22, 2022)
  • Ordinary Folks, Unique Events
  • The Best News Ever
• “Jesus, Human on His Mother’s Side: the Incarnation” (December 25, 2021)
  • …The Light Shines in the Darkness – – –
  • – – – And the Darkness Has Not Overcome It….

² ‘On, Grogu! on, Spongebob! on, Gromit and —:

• Wikipedia
  • Grogu (AKA Baby Yoda)
  • SpongeBob SquarePants (Character)
  • A Visit from St. Nicholas (AKA ‘The Night Before Christmas’, ”Twas the Night Before Christmas’)

³ One of these days maybe I’ll talk about him, but not today:

• Wikipedia
  • Ignatius of Loyola