“Maybe Christmas, he thought, doesn’t come from a store. Maybe Christmas, perhaps…means a little bit more!” – Dr. Seuss.

I know a lot of people who overdo Christmas and many who don’t do it at all. I like Dr. Seuss’s idea. For me, Christmas means perhaps a little bit more.

Christmas’s smells and emotions are the smells and emotions of childhood in many ways; they linger through life.

It is an exceptional holiday for me, as much about feeling as anything else. I’m not a Christian, but I am happy to celebrate Jesus Christ’s message of love and empathy, as timely a message in 2020 as it has ever been.

It’s not fair to forget his message on Christmas.

Jesus and his life made it possible for countless millions, even billions, of people to understand a new way of life, but more importantly, a new way of living it.

This year and always, my Christmas wish is for his compassion and justice message for the poor and the vulnerable to be felt and heard in our country.

This is my first Christmas Message from Bedlam Farm. It always seemed presumptuous of me to offer one, but I thought it might be useful this year.

The next month will be difficult, even frightening. It will pass. I see it as the end of something awful, not the beginning.

I can’t pretend this Christmas is no different from the others. It is very different; people of heart will struggle for peace and calm amidst so much turbulence and conflict.

Instead of comforting and guiding us, many of our leaders choose to frighten and diminish us. That is an assault on what Christmas means.

I’m not going to let that happen to me, and I hope the people reading this can do the same. My Christmas will be a time of renewal and nourishment.

Christmas reminds me of what is important to me. At the beginning of 2020, I set these goals and made these promises: no one in the Bishop Maginn High School Community would go hungry this year or be without protection from the virus.

No Mansion resident would fall to the Coronavirus. No Mansion aides would want food or for toys for their children.

No Mansion resident or refugee child would go with warm clothes for the winter or air conditioning in the summer.

We kept every promise. No Mansion resident or Bishop Maginn student got sick.  We made our own miracles. Merry Christmas.

I could never have achieved all of these goals by themselves. The Mansion aides and Bishop Maginn teachers worked brutishly hard all year; they are heroes; the Army Of Good was there every day in every way.

I was thinking, the same goals work well in 2021,

On Christmas, I think of Benjamin Franklin, who wrote that “a good conscience is a continual Christmas.”

That is what Christmas means to me. The posturing and scheming and lying of politicians mean nothing to me, especially this week. If Jesus is really the son of God, he can deal with the people who despoil his birthday.

This is a healing week for me.

Zinnia, my official Recovery Dog, knows how to relax and get in touch with her soul. She loves to sleep with her head resting on my foot. She reminds me to find the peaceful place within me, as she has found hers.

I wish to celebrate Christmas’s true spirit, which has to do with love and gentleness, not grievance and rage.

I have to be honest about it, this year, Christmas comes with the elephant in the room. He is our President, Mr. Trump. He and many of his followers seem disinterested in Christmas and have no need or interest in the Christmas spirit.

In fact, he seems determined to be the Gringe this year, he wants to steal our Christmas as well as our election.

Mr. Trump took a good deal from me these past four years and gave me a good deal, but I’m not giving him my Christmas. And he’s not getting the election. It’s a choice, really.

I wish him a peaceful Christmas, full of peace and compassion.

This will be my Christmas offering:

In honor of my three surgeries this year, I bought myself a beautiful silver necklace. I am grateful for the work done on my heart and the rest of my body.

On it, the six synonyms of Gratitude are inscribed on a hexagonal pendant. A custom swivel permits the pendant to rotate during wear.

The synonyms are spelled out in software code, ASCII Rays.

They are Appreciation, Beneficence, Cherishment, Detection, Esteem, and Fulfillment. The necklace will be on over my heart day and night every day of the year and for the rest of my life and will remind me to be grateful for every day of my life,  for the love and meaning I have found.
It will also remind me to be kind and generous and care for the needy and the vulnerable to the end of my days.

For me, this is a time of peace, of the generosity of spirit, of stepping away judgment and anger. I reject a life of grievance; I will not speak poorly of my life.

This afternoon, Maria and I will be heading off to a beautiful inn in Vermont for two nights and two days. We will be returning Christmas morning to spend the day with our wonderful farmhouse and our animals.

We’re bringing nothing but our books and our always deepening love for one another. I’m still in some pain and some discomfort, but and recovering steadily, and the inn is a great place to relax. I will miss my Recovery Dogs, Zinnia, and Bud.

Surgeries and challenges define and reveal the meaning of love and Christmas too. This surgery was painful and messy and challenging, for the caretaker every bit as much as the patient.

I would not wish to be taking care of me and cleaning up after me this week, but Maria does it as if she loves to do it. We do that for each other, and that, I guess, is what love is about.

That is also what Christmas is about.

What is Christmas?

It is tenderness for the past, courage for the present, hope for the future.

As with life, we make our own way. I hope yours is as joyous and meaningful as mine.