Home for Christmas
Tampa, FL*
December 25, 2019
We’ve reflected before on Chesterton’s observation that there are two ways of getting home.
One is to stay there. The other is to wander the world till we return to our original place.
In some sense, we have done both. We left home three and a half decades ago. And we have returned again this week. But all the while, our heart remained.
For the first time in three years, we are in Tampa for Christmas. We arrived yesterday afternoon. My mother met us at the airport, despite these missives giving her ample incentive to strand at least one of us.
Late in the afternoon, we heard Christmas Vigil Mass. The soul in the heart of downtown Tampa, Sacred Heart was for decades my grandparent’s parish. Dedicated in 1905, it was…till the Jesuits withdrew their affiliation a century later…the church associated with their, and my, high school.
The small shrine of sturdy granite, majestic marble, and delicate stained glass almost compels exaltation. An ethereal transept supports a 135 foot dome, fronts an altar of Carrara marble, and is attired this week in an elegant ensemble of garland, poinsettia, statuary, and light.
This Romanesque church is among the oldest and most beautiful on the west coast of Florida. The Franciscans, whose founder created the first crèche and nurtured feathered flocks, now rule the roost in our local duomo away from domo.
Like seeing a re-run of the Benny Hill Show, watching a live episode of Dance Fever, or drinking a glass of Carlo Rossi (OK, bad example), Christmas Mass always brings to mind my grandparents.
For the last several years of their respective lives, we drove them to the church, guided them to the pew, and sat or kneeled solemnly beside them. Without fail, my grandfather checked his watch at each end of the homily…and timed the sermon.
After ten minutes (not nine-minutes-fifty-nine seconds; not ten-minutes-and-one second), a surreptitious sideways salvo, under the cover of his breath, would launch: “This priest loves the sound of his own voice. He thinks we came to hear him give a goddam speech!”
Sometimes, as the priest droned on, my grandfather would doze off. This reminded me of the nervous English preacher, speaking softly to a snoozing peer seated beside King Charles II. “My Lord, My Lord”, he would implore, “you snore so loud you will wake the King.”
At Mass, our king rarely slept. But if he did, we let him. He would need it to get through the rest of the evening.
Having, as my grandfather used to say, “gotten Mass over with”, we returned home for second communion. There we found my parents in all the vestments of Happy Hour, ready to lead the evening‘s vespers. Brett and Jennifer soon arrived, rounding out the choir.
Christmas conjures timeless images and abiding customs. Bing Crosby on the radio, It’s A Wonderful Life on the TV, Christmas cards on the counter, relatives around the room, presents under the tree, lights on the lawn, egg nog in a ladle, fruitcakes in the fridge, wreath on the door, stockings by the chimney, turkey on a table, and family seated ‘round – grace on their lips, with hands poised to prey.
These are familiar seasonal scenes. Common tropes when dreaming of a trite Christmas. The twelve clichés of Christmas. Old chestnuts, roasted on a frozen fire. Intractable signs of Christmas presence.
Like the Romans at Cannae, we are surrounded by these entrenched images, all marching to the cadence of Madison Avenue copy, the pulse of invisible airwaves, and the colors from Norman Rockwell’s brush.
Not that these aren’t fine rituals, comforting and reassuring. We ardently adhere to some, casually dispense with others, and almost instinctively apply our own variations to the rest.
In this house, we shun nog ladles and punch bowls…sticking instead with martini shakers, whiskey bottles, and wine carafes. Tonight, Jerry will spare the oven a trey of lean turkey, and burden the grill with cuts of thick steak. And, in a bloodless coup, my mother’s marvelous mousse pie years ago dethroned a fruitcake that never reigned in this realm.
Seasonal songs enhance the festivities. But we’ll see my mother storming Walmart the day after Thanksgiving before she asks Alexa to play Der Bingle the night before Christmas. For our congregation, Ana Gasteyer is a more appropriate cantor (particularly this hymn).
Still, traditions do matter. Festive wreaths adorn doors. Strings of seasonal lights enliven the lawn. Colorful bulbs dangle from front-porch palms. Like all red-blooded Floridians, my parents will crank the AC to kindle a fire…the hearth about which Brett, Jennifer, and our three beautiful nieces will join us later this morning.
And gather round it we must. To see each other and…most importantly, and compulsorily…to “look at the tree”.
My parent’s tree is captivating and nostalgic, bearing ornamental reminders of the places they’ve seen and the people they’ve been. Few limbs lack a bulb, elf, craft, or Kringle denoting or connoting the continents (all of them), countries (most of them), or cultures (many of them) my parents have been privileged to enjoy…or at least to experience.
Below the branches is the annual abundance of packages. We have in prior years gazed at such amplitude under similar trees. And we swore…with twinkles in our eyes…many a mendacious oath that in the future we would defy our past, and limit our presents.
But where’s the joy in that? Despite all of us being blessed to want little and need less, our exchanges have always been fun, not feigned.
We know that…as good cologne should not smell like cologne, nor good acting be perceived as acting…the spirit of Christmas must come naturally, and never feel forced. In this house it never does.
Until this year. And this note is the prod. But it is not being wielded in my parent’s house.
The scenes above are the product of recollection and imagination, based on memories of years past, and those we expected to make this week. But despite our best-laid plans, we are not in Tampa. We are in Atlanta, hastily writing a new script.
David came down with flu symptoms Monday night, so we cancelled our trip yesterday morning, a couple hours before our Tampa flight was to depart. We unpacked our bags, returned gifts to beneath our tree, spared our pets the ordeal of being boarded, and prepared to spend a quiet Christmas in our own home.
We were disappointed by the change-of-plans, and concerned for our son’s health. But we know both will be fine. Thoreau said it is never too late to make new habits. The same can be said of plans. We accept, absorb, and adapt. Notwithstanding short notice and a small crowd, we will celebrate, and ensure this Christmas is not just another Wednesday.
Yesterday, Rita braved the Christmas Eve crowds, and re-stocked the refrigerator we had strategically emptied over the prior week. Last night, we attended Mass at our parish in Buckhead, Holy Spirit Catholic Church. The service was beautiful…and the sermon short.
Our pastor, Monsignor Edward Dillon, is fond of reminding us that God would not be God if He were God the way we would be God if we were God. Christmas is a perfect example. An infant in a cave, under the hills about Bethlehem.
The Nativity is, as CS Lewis said of Shakespeare’s sonnets, so odd a story that it is difficult to regard it as fiction. Skeptics consider it unlikely. The Faithful consider it incredible.
Christmas rises above temporal frivolities, by descending to the most hallowed of hollows. The Magi followed a star in the heavens, and saw its source in the ground. They sought Heaven in the sky, and found it under the earth.
No man expected, nor could have imagined, such a humble Incarnation, what Chesterton called an inversion of the universe. A baby whose hands created the cosmos, yet could not reach the cattle. Eyes of wonder and worship that had always gazed outward seeking the largest things, now turned inward to the smallest.
In a way, our change of plans caused us to do the same. It takes a while to return home. Or to stay there. Either way, it is worth the trip.
Merry Christmas.
JD
*Atlanta, GA
