Christmastide

Someone reminded me the other day that it is still Christmastide. My dad explained Christmastide to me when I asked him why we had a vacation from school in the middle of winter. Our school still called it Christmas Vacation then. He mentioned the song “The Twelve Days of Christmas” and told me that Christmastide lasts until January 5^th. I didn’t participate in Christmastide activities at church growing up, but I usually enjoyed it.

My sister and I usually spent our Christmas vacations staying with grandparents, cousins, or our mom. When I got old enough to take the bus on my own my cousin and I would knock around downtown St. Paul. I later explored the Twin Cities by bus on my own during Christmastide. I thought this was great fun. I saw places I didn’t get to see very often and had conversations with people I normally would not have: bus drivers, fellow passengers, waitresses, store clerks, panhandlers and librarians.

I think I spent most of the time between Christmas and New Year’s Day exploring the radio dial one year. I am grateful that I got to attend many different kinds of New Year’s Eve parties. My aunt and uncle usually had a big dinner on New Year’s Day. After I grew up and moved out of town I spent part of Christmastide traveling between Columbus and Minneapolis. I flew out to Phoenix and back for Christmas of 2001 – just a few months after 9/11.

These days I don’t get to knock around during Christmastide the way I used to. I have a job and a mortgage and a kid. This makes me grateful for social media and the Internet in general. I hope that I can give my son the same sense of wonder and adventure that the Christmastide helped me develop as I was growing up.