St. Nicholas

Jolly old Saint Nicholas, lean your ear this way,
don't you tell a single soul what I'm going to say ...

Today is the Feast of St. Nicholas.  He was a real person - but who?  And how did he evolve into the character that we in the U.S. now know as Santa Claus?

Nicholas was born in the 3rd century in Asia Minor (modern-day Turkey).  He became bishop of his province, the capital of which was called Myra.  He died on December 6th in about AD 343 and was interred in his cathedral.  Other than that -- and the fact that he lived a life holy enough for people to herald him as a saint after his death -- we have very little information about him.

Legends abound, however.  It is said that he fought against the Christian heresies of his day, was persecuted and imprisioned for the faith, the later attended the Council of Nicea in AD 325.  He is also reputed to have been a great protector of children and young people, rescuing them from slavery, kidnapping, and prostitution.  One famous story talks about how Nicholas would provide a dowry for poor girls who otherwise may have not ever been able to get married.

Nicholas is also said to have had the habit of giving presents anonymously, leaving coins in the shoes of the needy.  This legend -- as well as a reputation for loving children -- was what probably began the morphing of a church saint into our jolly popular culture figure.  In the Netherlands, Sinterklaas (origin of the English version of the name, Santa Claus) still leaves presents in children's shoes on Dec. 6th.

The big-bellied, red-suited, ho-ho-hoing character in today's Christmas legend may not look anything like what we think of as a saint, but his name (Saint Nicholas - Sinterklass - Santa Claus) and certain attributions certainly link him to a holy man in Asia Minor many centuries ago.

Gingerbread Houses

The Dear Hubby and I went to the exhibit of gingerbread houses at the Fort Wayne (Indiana) History Center yesterday.  It's a yearly thing, and it's a contest.  There are several categories, including those for children, teens, adults, and professionals, working individually or as a team.

We were delighted by the wide variety of gingerbread constructions.  What follows are just a few of the pictures we took. These are not necessarily the "best" or the winning entries, but rather a sort of cross section.   Sadly, we did not think to make a note of  the names of the authors of each creation.

Those of you in the Fort Wayne area really should make an effort to go to this because it's lots of fun to see all the gingerbread structures -- not to mention that the whole place smells like yummy cookies!

This one was my husband's favorite.  He said he chose that one because of them all, this was the one he'd most like to live in.

They weren't all "people houses"; these birdhouses are all made of gingerbread.

One of my favorites, partly because I can identify with the character (she's baking and I love to bake), but mostly because of the charming details.  See the broken egg on the floor?

A more winterish, rustic take on the whole gingerbread thing.  Very refreshing.

A Nativity in gingerbread -- one of those things you'd never thought of before but which seems obvious when you are presented with the concept.

Mmmm, chocolate.  My husband might want to live in that pink castle, but I think I'd choose this as a residence.

A castle with a detail I just loved:  gingerbread men wrapped in aluminum foil to make knights! 

Being "in the doghouse" wouldn't be so bad if the place were made of gingerbread ...

Isn't that twisty pretzel tree just fabulous in this one?

On the First Day of Christmas ...

We're all familiar with the first line of a well-known Christmas song: On the first day of Christmas my true love gave to me a partridge in a pear tree ...

But just exactly when is the first day of Christmas?

Nowadays many people in the United States think of the "twelve days of Christmas" as starting on December 13th and culminating in Christmas Day itself. According to this system, it's all over and done with by December 26th. Historically, however, the Christmas season (at least in the West) has been celebrated starting on December 24th/25th and continuing until Epiphany on January 6th. That would make December 25th the "first day of Christmas" and the evening of January 5th the twelfth.

Nowadays it's common to put the Christmas tree up the day after Thanksgiving -- if we even wait that long! Christmas advertising begins long before that, and Christmas carols start ringing and jingling some time in November. Then we're all sick of it by December 26th, when some people actually take down their Christmas decorations. What's been lost in the shuffle is the concept of the two related yet distinct seasons at this time of year: Advent (the time of preparation and anticipation leading up to Christmas) and Christmas itself (from December 24th until Epiphany or a little beyond that).

Have you ever seen one of those Christmas countdown calendars, where there are little numbered "windows" in the picture and you open one each day until Christmas? They are also (and more properly, in my opinion) known as Advent calendars, and were originally intended to mark the days until the beginning -- not the end -- of the Christmas season.

Advent began today. It always starts on the Sunday closest to November 30th and goes for about four weeks. On the evening of December 24th -- Christmas Eve -- the actual Christmas season begins. So while part of me will join the society around me in enjoying a raucous secular Christmastime during the first three weeks or so of December, another part of me will also be celebrating Advent in a more quiet, reflective way -- and starting a whole other round of Christmas revelry near the end of the month.

The Beginning

Like most people, I celebrated holidays pretty unconsciously for the first decades of my life. By that I mean that I did whatever it was that was done on each holiday, but without reflecting much on the why of those things -- what they meant and where and when they had originated.

All that changed some time during my years as a teacher of English as a foreign language to young adults in Mexico. (I lived in Mexico City from 1983 to 2006 and taught at the language center of the Instituto Politécnico Nacional during much of that time.) Students would ask questions, or a topic would appear in a textbook or reading comprehension exercise, and I would find myself needing to describe and explain our American holiday observances and traditions. As often happens to teachers, I was the one to learn the most.

At first, I was working in pre- and early-Internet times, so my principal resources were books and magazine articles. Jack Santino's book, All Around the Year: Holidays and Celebrations in American Life (published in 1995 by Illini Books) became my new favorite book, but I read many. I loved learning about the historical, folkloric, and religious aspects of holidays and holy days, both the ones in the United States and those in Mexico and elsewhere. I enjoyed seeing how geography, anthropology, psychology, sociology, history, theology and other disciplines enriched the study of these special occasions. Most of all, though, I was fascinated to learn why we did we did the things we did on the days that we did.

I am by no means an "expert" on holidays and traditions, but I definitely an enthusiast. In this blog I hope to share with you some of what I have learned through the years and from many sources.