I heart Xmas!

4 Dec 2010 news 0 Comments

I hope you’ve been keeping up with the Smugglivus festivities over at The Book Smugglers.  My post is up today—no list of favorite books, no excitement over upcoming releases…just my unabashed love of the holidays!

The holidays are a moment to contemplate the meaning of redemption and renewal, and we access these ideas through narrative. Every Christmas eve I watch the 1951 version of Scrooge starring Alistair Sim—I recite the lines I now know by heart (penned by Dickens, one of my favorite authors). And I time it so that the film ends right at midnight; my last thought before going to bed is of the miser Ebenezer’s spiritual transformation, and I wake on Christmas Day to the pealing of bells in Brooklyn. Giving is an important part of Christmas, but I refuse to shop—I try to give things that I’ve made by hand, and otherwise I donate to charity on a loved one’s behalf. That hasn’t gone over so well in my family; there wasn’t much cheer the year I gave everyone personalized haiku…