The month of December can often be wet and cold and the sky can be grey with very little sunshine. Thoughts of the commercial side of Christmas in this current economical downturn does not do much for the human sprit. The arrival of Christmas cards with the comforting thought of relatives and friends thinking about us and wishing us a happy and a holy Christmas, can often be uplifting.
Certainly when I was a child and I am talking about a time before television and glossy magazines, the arrival of the Christmas cards was an exciting time. They came from Canada, London, USA and Dublin. From towns, villages, country lanes, convents and monasteries and they were all different and beautifully coloured and embossed, sprinkled with sugar-like glitter. My mother would tie a string across the wall about the mantle piece and the cards would be spread out in view of everyone, and visitors over the Christmas period would take time to read them.
One card in particular I remember, was a scene of a covered mountain with a small boy and a man who I can only assume was his father, dragging a Christmas tree to a log cabin, where his mother and sister were waiting at the door. I can’t remember the rhyme on the card or who it was that sent it, but I was enchanted by this particular card and kept it for some time after. Like the snow that year it disappeared, but I know some people who have kept particular cards for years, perhaps maybe it was a dear friend or a close relative who sent it.
Whatever the reason it is a lovely way to remember. My wife has a Christmas card that her father sent to his mother from the battlefields of France during the second world war, it is a simple card more like a postcard picturing the baby Jesus. Little did that 17 year old soldier realise when he posted that Christmas card home, that years later it would be a family treasure.
I often think that Christmas cards tell a story, not only of Christmas but also of the sender. The most generous and caring person sends a more meaningful card both in image and rhyme, and for less thoughtful and not so caring this is also reflected in their choice of card. When I was young, a game I would play was to try and work out who sent the cards just by looking at the picture and not reading the name of the sender, and it would work most of the time. Of course now that I am older and wiser, I do realise that it’s the thought that counts and not what kind of card it is. Having said that we now live in a time when we have to be careful about what kind of Christmas card we send because of political correctness, so that we don’t offend others. A recent survey in a newspaper showed that only one percent of Christmas cards have images like the Nativity.
Tom
