Blog Post

A Time For Traditions

Carol Rogers-Shaw • Dec 12, 2019

Walking throughout New York City this weekend, past the horse-drawn carriages in Central Park, by the Christmas market at Columbus Circle, around the towering tree in Rockefeller Center, my husband and I talked about the power of tradition. As we strolled by sidewalk Christmas tree stands, we watched workers push the trees through plastic netting and saw city dwellers hoist their purchases over their shoulders, heading for home. We took in the smell of balsam and spruce, and he remembered his childhood.

For my husband, the smell of Christmas trees on city sidewalks always heralds the arrival of the season and draws up memories of growing up on Kingsbridge Road in the Bronx. His family would head to the corner stand to buy a tree which his father lugged up the stairs to the apartment with the holiday banner of an old-fashioned Santa Claus taped to its door. Inside, the tree would be decorated with glass ornaments and strings of large multi-colored lights, its fragrance filling his home.

For me, the tree was always decorated late in the day on Christmas Eve, after a morning spent baking cookies and breads. My mother would clean up the flour dusted counters of the kitchen as my father strung the lights on the tree, also multicolored ones, but the small size. Ornaments, many hand-made and reminiscent of family trips or celebrations, covered the boughs like a patchwork of our lives. After the ornaments were placed and the garland looped, my father and I would add the tinsel, me placing delicate strands, my father laughing as he threw clumps of silver on sagging branches.

Marriage requires an adjustment to tradition. I remember a friend whose first married Christmas required two trees, one stately with bright white lights, red and gold glass balls and flowing ribbons; the other blinking multi-colored lights, popcorn and cranberry strands and quirky elf and reindeer ornaments. For us, it was one tree, small multi-colored lights, homemade and sentimental ornaments, but no tinsel. We still bake on Christmas Eve, but the tree goes up one evening before Christmas as we nibble on hors d’oeuvres, sip eggnog, and talk about when we bought particular ornaments and what memories they evoke. There’s always the branch of dog ornaments and lots of sports themed ones. There’s also a new one Tom and I buy each year, just for us, a tradition started on our first Christmas together 39 years ago.

Traditions are powerful as they bring sweet memories, a sense of belonging, of love and family. They reflect values and practices we hold dear. They give a glimpse of who we are, what relationships matter to us. Yet they can also evoke the sadness and pain of loss or the fear of change.

Many years ago, at the faculty lunch table after the holiday break, a colleague described the photograph he took each year of his four children sitting on the stairs in age order waiting anxiously to descend to the living room where Santa’s bounty awaited under the Christmas tree. That year his family was enjoying a late breakfast, having opened the presents and dressed for church, when his youngest child noted with alarm that they had forgotten to take the picture. Despite his children being adults beginning their careers or finishing college, they raced back upstairs to put their pajamas back on and pose for the picture. There was a sense that without the traditional photograph, the breaking of tradition would curse the family holiday. We cling to those traditions that make us feel safe and loved, but sometimes tradition can become a burden, stifling new possibilities for different kinds of love and care and bliss and excitement.

Traditions are difficult to surrender, yet often we don’t have a choice. I remember the year there were no multi-colored lights, no Christmas tree, no clumps of tinsel. I was 11. It was the year my younger brother died. He was 7. The pain still lingers. Today I think of the ornaments my husband and I have collected each year and tears fall as I envision the year when there won’t be a new one, when one of us will look through the box and feel the pain of profound loss.

There are all kinds of traditions, some sweet and sentimental, some uplifting and inspiring, some familial and some that place us within a community. There are also some better left to die as doing something just because it’s always been done can exclude others, evoke fear, or lead to despair. The carrying on of tradition can make us feel safe and loved. The ending of tradition can make us feel afraid or sad. Following tradition is not always within our control, yet the power of tradition is undeniable. I can’t but hope that this year, whether we follow old traditions or make new ones, there’s more that bring love and joy than that bring heartbreak and dread.

Photo Credits: Photos by Carol Rogers-Shaw

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