Hello and Happy December!

The closer December came this year, the longer my lists seem to get and the shorter my patience. I decided I needed to be proactive in taking things out of my schedule that just didn’t have to be there and in giving myself more quiet time just to be. Doing that made me think about the newsletter I wrote you for another December…with the subject of building some quietness into our lives during this busy season. I remembered that so many of you wrote about how much you enjoyed that newsletter. So—for my own sake—and, I hope, for your renewed enjoyment, I’m sharing that previous newsletter with you again. May each of us have quieter holidays.

Here is the earlier newsletter:

How can we make December a month that has nurturing quiet moments in the midst of all the activity, special events, gift-giving and days off from work? I know that many people lament the hectic holidays. A friend said to me last week: “I really don’t like Christmas; everything is so commercial.” I think I know where she is coming from—who does enjoy hearing Jingle Bells in August piped throughout the mall?

This is my sister Barbara and me when we were little girls. She’s the short one.

But I find myself thinking about the month a little different from my friend. What a wonderful thing, I say to myself…to have a designated time of the year when one of the main activities is to give people a gift! One of my happiest memories from my childhood was a rainy day in December when my sister, Barbara, and I each put all the coins we had been saving into a little yellow envelope and Mother took us to town (which was downtown Chattanooga). We had to walk to the bus stop and then take the city bus to Market Street, where we were able to get off right in front of Woolworth’s Five and Dime Store. We stepped off the bus, the light drizzle just enough to make us walk a little faster to get under the canopy of the building, and there we were in the middle of so many people. People going into the store; people coming out of the store; people on the sidewalk going up and down Market Street. The Salvation Army lady was there by her kettle at the door of the store, ringing her little bell and saying thank you when someone dropped a dime or nickel into the pail. Mother shepherded us into the store, and I still remember the swoosh of warm air that hit us as we stepped inside. And I remember the song that was playing throughout the store: “Silver bells…silver bells…It’s Christmas time in the city…jing-a-ling…let them ring…soon it will be Christmas day.”

	A few gifts wrapped and ready to give!

Oh, I was so excited. So happy to be about to buy my presents for the family and Betty Thacker, my best friend. I had made a list and divided the amount of money I had, so I knew how much I could spend on each present. Mother stood back and let Barbara and me do our shopping. The aisles were crowded and the counters full, but we didn’t care…that was how it was supposed to be when you did your Christmas shopping. Finally, we got all the names crossed off on our list, and Mother took us to the food counter where we had toasted pimento cheese sandwiches and a big strawberry milkshake. The woman waiting on us even put the gleaming metal milkshake container down on the counter by our glasses (I remember the chill on the metal and the little droplets of water going down the side) so we could pour the last little bit of that milkshake in our glass when we were ready. Then it was get back on the bus, finding a way to handle all the sacks of this and that which we had bought, and go back to Rossville and home, where the joy of wrapping all these little gifts still awaited.

That memory prepared me for my adult life, I think, because today I love the Christmas season, busy, crowded, planning, celebrating. But I have learned over the decades since that “Silver Bells day of shopping” that it is important to build in some “off time” and some “off actions” during the holidays. One thing I love to do is buy an amaryllis during the Christmas season—the kind that is only a bulb and that says on the box, “Will bloom in 5-6 weeks.” I put this flower-in-waiting in a place that I can see it, knowing how beautiful it is going to be in January, but also knowing that there is a lesson here for me. Something about the importance in my life of a quiet, growing season, a time when a bloom is promised but not yet present, a time when you water and you wait.

Another quiet activity I build into the Christmas season is beautiful music on the cd player. Oh, we listen to our Christmas cds, too, from the Saturday after Thanksgiving on! But I also keep a stash of cds full of quiet harmony. This morning I was playing Barber’s Adagio for Strings and the Cowboy Junkies’ Dreaming a Dream of You. Then next was Elvis’s Amazing Grace and Gary Primms’ beautiful piano renditions of old hymns. I also keep a cd of Gregorian chant in my portable cd player and when I need to slow down during the holiday season I sit down and listen.

So, perhaps a good way to think about this wonderful, glorious season is a word like balance. Keeping balance. Matching active hours with quiet hours. Thinking about what it really means to have people to whom you are connected and to whom you want to give a gift…when you think about that it is truly wonderful!…at the same time that you think about how to pace the buying and wrapping of these presents from one heart to another.

And always listening for the “silver bells.” You never know when you might hear them.

Love,

Dr. Elizabeth Harper Neeld offers wisdom and practical insights to anyone whose life is in a time of transition, change, grief and loss of any kind. As an internationally recognized and accomplished consultant, and author of more than twenty books - including Tough Transitions and Seven Choices: Finding Daylight After Loss Shatters Your World - she is committed to work that helps lift the human spirit.