208 December 2011 BTM lastword to be accomplished. Perhaps I am reminded at this time of year how old I do feel, inside. Single, the wrong side of 40, and as another year simply passes me by yet again, the woman of my dreams still eludes me. Do people on other calendars, who do not celebrate Christmas, feel the same pangs of regret, remorse and a similar lack of accomplishment at this time of year? Is it a Western feeling? An antipodean one or one instilled into us from birth being told that, “’tis the season to be jolly,” and when we aren’t, we question why? Calvin Coolidge, the 30th President of the United States, (1872-1933) stated, “Christmas is not a time nor a season, but a state of mind. To cherish peace and goodwill, to be plenteous in mercy, is to have the real spirit of Christmas.” Of the modern Christmas spirit, one of my colleagues says he is still excited on opening every seasonal card that there is cash inside. There rarely is, though, yey hope springs external! The young gun, Mr Twenty-something, tells us his grandmother sends hundreds of dollars inside every one of his Christmas cards as she is ageing and needs to get rid of it all before she goes. I’m hoping to become her friend on Facebook before next Christmas and just pray she hangs around a few more after that to send me some. For whatever reason, Christmas or New Year for me is a time of reflection, wanted or not. I can’t help it! Perhaps if we all take the time to reflect upon the year that has just passed and make a promise to ourselves to do better in the next, to feel more for others, to assist those in need, to be better people and to call home more often, then the world would be a better place. But that would be to deny history; we just seem to make the same mistakes over and over again. But whatever you think, though, just think it to yourself. I get the feeling that if you talk about this stuff out loud, it becomes a New Year’s resolution, and no one ever sticks to them! I spend my time at this point of time happily looking toward to another year without regard for much, other than work and money. Yet I know I will stand solemnly on the 23rd or 24th December, with the right piece of music playing in my iPod, only to discover tears welling in my eyes. Is it that the summit, the zenith of yet another year, that pangs my heart with remorse? As I start to remember those loved and lost ones, do I start to recall what Christmas was like in my youth? Surely not! I am fast heading towards being 50; life has been good to me. I pass as a thirty-something in the good looks department! What’s to grieve or feel remorse for? Don Cupitt, the famed English philosopher once stated, “Christmas is the Disneyfication of Christianity.” And I kind of agree. Anything Hallmark has a card for seems to have become an animated overture for a real occasion, and slipped from ‘serious’ to ‘serious waste of money’ within my own lifetime. Most of the holidays I remember with joy as a child now mean little to me. Easter is just for kids with its chocolate, eggs, bunnies and Easter egg hunts; Valentine’s I know shun — either I need to send out too many cards or none, and every year the names are different. Halloween is supposed to be about free candy. But I was born in a country where it did not exist, so it doesn’t really rate on my calendar of yearly events either. And birthdays I have long forgotten; my mother said she only need look in the mirror to be reminded of her age. But if she is as old as she looks, then she really had kids too late in life! So, perhaps it’s not Christmas, perhaps it’s the close proximity of it, to the end of the year that tugs my heart down. There is a realisation that, despite how hard I worked all year, yet again there are innumerous tasks of work and life still yet JAMES CLAIRE Why is it that I empathise with myself at this time of year? It seems such an odd experience, when it is the season of giving and embracing others. A Personal Empathy
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