Christmas is a Bridge

"I once said that Christmas is a bridge. We need bridges as the river of time flows past. Today's Christmas should mean creating happy hours for tomorrow and reliving those of yesterday. This year I find myself remembering a Christmas long ago, when Connie was two and her father sat at the piano, holding her on his lap and showing her how to play "Silent Night" with one finger. I remember Jill, who shared Stillmeadow with me for so many years, bright and dark, and her two children, Barbara and David, who tiptoed down one midnight to check for Santa and almost discovered two busy parents instead. Luckily, Star, our first cocker, heard what she thought were burglars on the stairs and raised the alarm.

I think, too, of Hal Borland, who loved this season most of all. Christmas to him meant walking down a snowy road in starlight with Barbara, his wife, and speaking quietly about the birth of Jesus. A carpenter and his wife traveled from Nazareth to Bethlehem. There was no room at the Inn. So the baby was born in the stable and laid to rest in a manger.

Princes and kings and warlords were spreading their power over the lands. What happened to them? Who remembers their deed? A few historians are knowledgeable about the Roman Empire. But by and large the rulers made no impact. The carpenter's son born in a manger came to speak in simple words to multitudes who listened. He talked about love and justice and the brotherhood of man. And today all over the world, his message sounds as clearly as it did in the hills of Judea. When we light the candles in honor of his birth, our listening hearts fill with hope for peace and love and justice to come.

Sometimes the holiday season is so busy and exciting that the deeper meaning of Christ's birthday is lost. It is good then to walk in the star-filled night, as Hal and Barbara used to do, and touch the real significance of this birthday."

~ Gladys Taber, from 'Still Cove Journal' (1981)