Farewell to a Favorite

(This is a few days late)

One of our longstanding Christmas Eve traditions has been to drive around and look at decorations. We would make it a contest between neighborhoods and try to seek out the very best in lighting magnificence. Our two favorite places turned out to be very different. One had every sort of inflatable, lightable, animatronic, cutesy, gaudy, cheesy, decoration imaginable, to the point where it was just plain fun. They had a horseshoe driveway and you drove in, circled around and drove out. There was a place to stop and put in a donation for electricity. We would often make two or three trips around.

The other place was the polar opposite. It was just lights, very tastefully strung on every single corner of the house, on every shrub, and up every main and secondary branch of every tree. Then it was set to music and controlled by computer. We would sit in front of the house and watch the show. It was jaw dropping.

The second house went on the market this year and I drove past a couple of week ago to see if they were still doing the lights. There was a large cherry-picker in the yard to take the lights off the trees and presumably the house.

Alas, another thing we love falls by the wayside.

Happy Boxing Day

I like to imagine that everyone is in their living rooms or dens or front yards with pillow-soft gloves, circling each other warily, hesitant to throw the first punch, hoping not to get tagged. I like to think that each family has set up a round-robin tournament and the winner gets the last slice of pie. I like to think the Holyfield family disqualifies certain members,

But I know that really they're all out exchanging stuff, and I know the stores are a far more dangerous place to be than in your living room with Uncle Ray trying to knock you on your ass.

Chanukah trees and Christmas menorahs

The timing of the Christmas tree has always been a tricky thing. Since our house was 75 percent Jewish the object was to try to have the tree up for as few Chanukah days as possible while also trying to enjoy the tree as much as possible, with the understanding that the net enjoyment of the tree is greater during days before than after Christmas Day. If this sounds like too much math, well, it is.

Some years the Jewish calendar is my friend, with Chanukah beginning very early in December and finishing in time to have the tree up for a week before Christmas. Other years Chanukah shoved me into a snow drift and laughed at me, starting a few days before Christmas and finishing whenever it damn well pleased. Those years the two factions had to compromise on the tree date, meaning neither side got what they wanted but both sides were happy. Usually if Chanukah didn't end by the 20th the tree was going up anyway.

And for the record there is something beautiful about lighting Chanukah candles on Christmas Eve,

The thing about it is that I've become really grumpy about the early start to the Christmas season that Big Retail foists upon us. Black Friday is depressing in its swallowing of Thanksgiving, and when I hear Christmas music on October 1st at Walgreens I'm ready to jab someone with a Hallmark ornament. If I were king I'd decree that nothing starts until December. I wouldn't want to see one roll of wrapping paper or hear even a solitary sleigh bell in the distance. Exceptions would be extended to people who have to ship stuff to Canada. I mean do you realize that nearly ten percent of the year is spent in Christmas season? Ten percent!

I'm not part of the put-Christ-back-in-Christmas movement, whose intentions are good but whose cause is lost. But I really think the season is better when it's shorter, more concentrated. Like putting up my tree on December 20. It's five days of enjoyment but it's a really good five days.

Yes, I know my cause is lost too. And as for how long the tree stays up AFTER Christmas, well that's another blog post.

Re-run Tuesday

This is from 2011 but is appropriate for the season. The groups I play in are smack in the middle of concert season and we've been playing Christmas and chanukah music for weeks.

 Here are some thoughts I had about it a couple of years ago. 

So you think you're already tired of Christmas music?

This is the time of year when people look forward to holiday concerts. At venues all over the area, local musical groups put on free and not so free performances of all your holiday favorites. You can hear concert bands at nursing homes, bell choirs in the gazebo on the town square, choruses in the mall, and small combos in whatever cafe nooks they can find. There is nothing like live music, which sets the tone for the season, and creates the backdrop for the memories we carry with us always.

But as you're just now starting to find your way to the live musical performances, we musicians have been rehearsing for weeks. One of the groups I play in began the holiday repertoire in early October, so we could be ready by this week, when we play the first of five concerts. Another of the groups I'm in (neither group is blog friendly, in that they do not have a web presence I can link to) started in late October. My friend's bell choir started weeks ago.

I've rehearsed Frosty the Snowman 6 times so far, The Christmas Song 5 times, Festive Sounds of Hanukkah (my personal favorite to play) 7 times and the Nightmare Before Christmas about 15 (it was new and we really needed the work on it). There was also a piece called the Eighth Candle (or something like that), with a tricky 5/8 time that we never polished up enough to present in public. Maybe next year.

You would think we're sick of it, but I can tell you we are not. I guess I cannot speak for all my band mates, but I've been playing Christmas and Hanukka music for almost 20 years now and I'm never tired of it. But I can say I don't listen to much of it on the radio until the last few days before Christmas. And since I rarely shop, I'm not subjected to the overhead music inspiring me to buy, buy, buy.

Here's what you can do to help your local musicians, Show up. Listen, Applaud. That's all we ask. It makes weeks of rehearsal completely worth it.