Even though they were Jewish, my parents enthusiastically celebrated Christmas, perhaps hoping to assimilate into the country both of their parents fled to. Maria’s family was Catholic, and both families had Christmas trees, gave presents, and enjoyed the feeling of the season.

We all kept this a secret from my Grandmother, who would have been horrified.

Maria and I do not religiously celebrate Christmas. We don’t go to services or get Christmas trees (we did for one year), and we are going away for two days the day after Christmas to a beautiful inn in Vermont, as we have done for years. That will be our only vacation of this year or next.

We do celebrate what is still, to us, the spirit of the holiday. We don’t shop for bargains; we deliver Christmas meals to families who ask for them. We will spend Christmas morning delivering a dozen meals to older people who can’t get out and people who asked to bring a meal to their homes for any reason.

A local community group organizes this Christmas meal program. For both of us, it is the true spirit of Christmas: the celebration of the life of a religious leader who introduced the idea to a rough and often cruel world that being human meant helping people with nowhere to go.

I will also make an extra effort to thank people who sell things to us and whom we meet during the day. Smiling and thanking people goes a long way toward fostering empathy and goodwill.

I wonder if Christ would spend the holiday looking for bargains on wall televisions. We look forward to it, to delivering the meals, and to getting a meaningful holiday. We hope it will last one day, but we are happy and fortunate to have this one.

We honeymooned there when we first got married and have returned every year since.

This afternoon, Maria strung a series of lights on the front porch. It will help light up our home and our dark road. We realized today that it will also make life easier for the Amazon Delivery people who have to drop off things on our porch occasionally.

I’d love to leave them up all year, but she likes to keep them only through the Christmas holiday. It does make them unique.

We expect a beautiful Christmas of love, giving, and hope.