A Few of My Favorite Things

This Yuletide, I find myself waxing nostalgic for reasons I can't explain. Maybe it's because I'm growing more fully aware of the passage of time. Battling health issues - even relatively minor ones - has a way of making you look at your own mortality. Maybe as the world seems to grow larger and darker and more sinister, I wish for the return of a simpler, brighter, and more innocent time.

Whatever the reason, it makes me think back to my childhood with a mix of sweet and of bitter. There was a purity of heart, a sense of astonished wonder, that I had as a child. Magick was real, and it was all around. Children can feel this magick. Their hearts are unburdened and open and exquisitely naive. The cynicism that comes with age hasn't touched them yet - cynicism that blinds adults to elves spying through windows and makes them feel foolish for looking for reindeer or sleigh tracks in the snow on Christmas Eve.

I remember the feelings of anticipation and excitement I had, knowing Santa was coming, wondering what would be in the wrapped packages beneath the tree. I can remember the feelings but I can't touch them anymore, can't taste them. When I was an age I can't quite remember, my cousin told me that Santa wasn't real. I didn't want to believe it but eventually, the facade fell, and I couldn't go back, couldn't un-learn, and the magick was lost to me. The part of my heart that believed in the jolly old elf who delivered presents to children swung shut.

Little by little, the simple joys of the season began to be lost. The unbridled glee of flying down a slippery hill on a sled or a saucer or even on a plastic garbage bag, tumbling to a halt at the foot of the slope only to climb up and do it all over again. Sitting by the radio early on a snowy morning, listening intently to the school closings, silently hurrying the announcers through their alphabetic list, ecstatic when they reached the B's and said, "Big Lake." Bundling up in snow pants and coat and scarf and hat and mittens and boots to conquer the drifts, building structures that were castles or forts or houses or, one year, even a dragon. Helping Mom make spritz cookies, using the copper and white cookie press, eating more dough than finished product. Being amused when Dad tried to sneak his gifts open out of turn, looking like a naughty child all the while, perhaps even thinking he was getting away with it without us noticing.

Time has a way of stripping the bad from a remembrance, creating a selective amnesia that allows only the good to flow through the filter. Sometimes a flight down the hill resulted in a bloody nose or other slight injury. Sometimes the announcers never said "Big Lake." The dragon melted away into a slushy pile on the lawn. Too much raw dough caused a stomachache. Dad hasn't been with us for six Christmases now.

Memories can be tarnished but, as with a cherished antique, the burnishing and imperfections can be what makes something valuable and loved. As the Skin Horse said in The Velveteen Rabbit: "Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don't matter at all, because once you are Real you can't be ugly, except to people who don't understand."

I don't mind the nicks and dings. What I miss is the heart-magick that seems to be inherent in us as children. The sweet innocence that lets us believe - TRULY believe, without reservation - there are toy-making elves and flying reindeer. The uninhibited spirit that allows us to get fully, totally, blissfully lost in the sensation as we fly down an icy hill or birth mystical creatures from snow.

I want to peel away the hardening of adulthood. I want to again know the joy of listening for sleigh bells and reindeer hooves on a cold December night. To experience the nearly painful anticipation of lying in bed, waiting as long as possible before rushing down the stairs to open presents. To fall back into the snow and make an angel and stare up at the sky, pondering the impossible number of possibilities.

I want the return of my favorite things.