Bah, Humblog! And the Seasonal Wisdom of Doctor Who

Let's not kid ourselves. This time of year can be our most joyous, but for most of us, the lead-up to a splashy Christmas and party-hearty New Year can be the most stress ridden and difficult part of the season. A lot of you are nodding in sisterly and justifiably cynical agreement, but there's always some Perfectly and Perpetually Poised Pollyanna who (with humiliating accuracy) reminds me that stress is a construct of my own response to internal or external forces that affect my life, self-imposed and over which I have complete control.

To her, I reply "Bah-Freakity-Humbug, and please go peddle your superhuman self-control and serenity somewhere else, girly! I'm doing the best I can with what I got."

I'm not good at managing my pre-Christmas angst. It's always our slowest time of year at our restaurant as we're so deep in the hinterlands and 40 miles away from any Christmas shopping areas. One eats where one shops, and we fall off everyone's radar. I get it, but knowledge aforehand doesn't make the annually inevitable financial pinch any easier to manage. And every year, there's some treat from the Universe that makes it all just a tiny bit more difficult. This December, Dan blew up his car ... I gave him mine to use and one of its fairly new tires promptly disintegrated on his way to work. That got fixed, but the process meant we had to be closed for half-day of much needed income. The good news was that the tire warranty netted a prorated refund of half the purchase price of the blown tire. The bad news was that three days later, the breaks on the car noisily and dangerously insisted on being replaced, at just over twice the cost of the tire refund.

But we and the car are safe and operational, so (knock on wood) it's probable the seasonal worst is over. I'm breathing again, keeping fingers and toes crossed that no more mini-disasters befall us and that just a little business will come our way. Both seem possible as the holiday proper nears, and we will be able to enjoy two rare, whole days off in a row together ... with food, drink, prezzies, movies, books and a family tradition, this year's Doctor Who Christmas episode!

In the midst of this week's automotive and business drama, I remembered my favorite modern holiday quote; it's from the 2010 "A Christmas Carol," a Whovian intragalactic re-imagining of Scrooge's transformation through the power of love and the Christmas spirit. The Scrooge-esqe, deeply cynical, old rich guy, Kazran Sardick, says:

"On every world, wherever people are, in the deepest part of the winter, at the exact mid-point, everybody stops and turns and hugs. As if to say, "Well done. Well done, everyone! We're halfway out of the dark." Back on Earth we call this Christmas. Or the Winter Solstice. On this world, the first settlers called it The Crystal Feast. You know what I call it? I call it expecting something for nothing! "

I certainly don't agree with his assessment of charity, loving kindness and generosity of spirit, but I was struck by the idea of being "halfway out of the dark" because that's how it feels to me so often.  I love of a lot of things about winter, but there is an undeniably strong, genetically hard-wired urge within all of us to draw nearer to the bonfire or the hearth fire, not just for warmth, but for the protection the fire light brings from all the dangers that lurk beyond in the dark. Our ancient ancestors had different things to fear, but even today we are wary of what may be waiting for us in the dark.

We still have to travel the rest of the way through an often harsh and sometimes frightening and destructive season.
I've always loved the Solstice especially because at that balance point, we begin the second half of the journey back into the light. Also implicit in Sardick's statement is the reminder that although we may pause and celebrate our triumph over the dark and the revisit the hope of more gentle seasons to come, there is still a way to go. But so far, so good.

So, sometime during the Christmas Eve Mexican dinner Dan and I will have, or during the Chinese Take-Out Christmas Day-all-day-feast, we'll pause and raise our glasses and send our good wishes into the aethers with a delicate clink to sound their coming. Our toast will be the words of Doctor Who himself; "Yeah. Christmas. Halfway out of the dark," because we know that in the second half of winter, the light becomes just a little brighter every day.

Whether you celebrate Christmas, Christmas and Boxing Day, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, Yule, Pancha Ganapati, HumanLight, Newtonmas or Festivus, I send you all big, smothery cyber-hugs with my best wishes that you enjoy ...

HAPPY HOLIDAYS !

Linking up with the wonderful Maricel at Tardis Tuesday! over at her always interesting site, My Closet Catalogue .  What a great Whovian Idea!