Eye of the Storm
True meaning of Christmas?
Robbis Storm

A former Lampasan, Robbis Storm is a world traveler and restaurateur. He can be contacted via e-mail at RStorm453@aol.com.

You hear it every year -- the question: "What's the true meaning of Christmas?"

Don't confuse this with a real question. It's not an invitation for a discussion or a dialogue. You're not supposed to answer. Shoot -- whether it's from a street corner or from the six o'clock news, the person mouthing the words doesn't really give a hoot what you think about the holiday season.

No. The only reason the question is asked is so that someone -- whether from pulpit or editorial page -- can tell us what he or she thinks about the true meaning.

Okay. I can live with that. But it's my turn now. I'm not going to ask a question, rhetorical or otherwise; I'm just going to flat out tell you about the meaning of the holiday. Or more to the point -- what it means to me. And by the way -- you can't hold me to it. I may change my mind tomorrow.

Here goes. It's fine to use the holiday to celebrate the birth of Jesus. So far as I know no one has a clue as to when his real birthday was, so December 25 is as good a day as any.

It's fine to celebrate the fact that winter is on the wane. All across the Northern Hemisphere various groups have celebrated the Winter Solstice and the fact that from now on (until late June) every day gives us a few more minutes of sunshine than we had the day before.

And it's fine that this is the time when some of us get out and shop till we drop.

This is the time of the year when our collective spending splurge gives the American economy a shot in the arm.

We can probably mention gift giving, feasting, and several other aspects of Christmas and its reason for being. But for me, this is time of the year to reconnect.

Reconnect? With what? Well -- certainly through Christmas Cards, parties, and dinners, most of us use this time to reach out to friends and family members. But for me this year, there's been a reconnection I didn't expect.

It all started with the Christmas tree. Last year Miriam and I decorated our tree with lights. Just lights. No ornaments. No icicles. No colored balls. Nothing but lights.

We covered the tree in a blanket of clear lights in a more or less regular pattern. But then we took colored lights -- reds, blues, and greens -- and placed them inside the tree branches, in swirls about the size of volleyballs.

It was different, a lot of fun, and the effect was as though we had created a universe -- the colored lights becoming swirling galaxies inside a larger cosmos of individual stars (the clear lights).

But this year we decided to have a more conventional tree. We put a few Christmas CDs on the player, got a blaze going in the fireplace, lit some candles, and began to decorate. First came the lights, then gold draping, and finally -- as we carefully placed the individual ornaments -- our tree began to look traditional. Old fashioned. Familiar. Like something Norman Rockwell might have painted. Like the trees my family had when I was a little boy.

All of a sudden I felt like it was 1948, I was 4 years old, and living in San Antonio with my parents. It was as though I could see Mom carefully draping tinfoil icicles on the branches. And there was Dad climbing a stepladder to attach the star at the top.

I halfway expected to see bubble lights suddenly appear. And then from our CD player came the lyrics, "Silver bells, silver bells...it's Christmas time in the city."

It took little imagination for me to hear the bells being rung by the Salvation Army Santa Claus on Commerce Street, around the corner from the Alamo. My nose could pick up the evergreen smells of pine, fir, and spruce at the openair Christmas tree markets. I could taste the cinnamon, cloves, and vanilla of holiday baking.

But my strongest memory came when I felt Dad's strong arms as he held me up so I could see the wonder and beauty of a carefully decorated store window at Joske's. To a little boy, the scenes looked like something from a story book. Fabulous. Amazing. Magic.

Of course, it's all changed. We haven't lived in San Antonio since 1950.

Nowadays most folks buy their gifts in an enclosed mall or on eBay. Virtually no one walks around downtown window shopping.

Joske's is now Dillard's. I'm 63 years old and have grandchildren of my own.

But the past is still a part of me. Dad's been dead 22 years and this will be Mom's first Christmas in a nursing home. Yet I still have memories of happier days.

So that's what this Yule season has come to mean to me: now, more than any other time of the year, I feel reconnected -- in touch with my family, friends, and a sea of pleasant memories.