The gifts are bought and wrapped. The pantry is fully stocked for any family members and friends who come our way in the next few days. All the things that can be done – the planning, the purchasing, the preparations – have been done. We’ve come to the moment in the season when Christmas is no longer about the things on our to-do list, but the people we love and the future we hope for.
“I will honour Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year. I will live in the Past, the Present, and the Future. The spirits of all three shall strive within me. I will not shut out the lessons that they teach.”
“Scrooge was better than his word. He did it all, and infinitely more…He became as good a friend, as good a master, and as good a man, as the good old city knew…And it was always said of him, that he knew how to keep Christmas well, if any man alive possessed the knowledge. May that be truly said of us, and all of us.”
—Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol (1843)
From the streets of Victorian England to the cities and towns of the 21st century American Midwest to wherever you are, Merry Christmas.
And God bless us, every one.