A Message from Your Very Recent Past

Dear Readers,

I wrote this column exactly one year ago, this week,(Or last week, depending on ‘where you are’, time-wise. Don’t worry, you’ll understand after you read it.) I did not ‘update’ the dates, intentionally. Time is a funny thing, and how this column ended came true, ‘in no time.’  Happy New Year!  Don’t waste a minute of it.

By G. E. Shuman

                When you read this in the paper, you will learn that you and I, right now, from both of our perspectives, are actually in two different times. We aren’t in two different time zones, not unless you live further west than do most of my readers. We are, literally, in two different times.  You see, you, as you live and breathe in the day in which you exist, ‘right now,’ are on the other side of a great divide that separates us; me at this writing, and you at the reading of it, by that magical millisecond after the ball drops, the horns blow, and the fireworks blast off proclaiming the beginning of a brand new year.

                You see, I am still in the year 2015, as I write these words, and you are not, as you read them.  I am writing on Wednesday, December 30^th, 2015, and you are reading this column ‘next year’, from my point of view.  I am way back in ‘last year’, to you.  Isn’t that strange?  Okay, so maybe it’s only me that is strange. I do have a different way of looking at things sometimes.  I remember hearing a comedian one time, joke that people always want to see a picture of him ‘when he was younger.’ His reply was that EVERY picture ever taken of him was when he was younger.  I guess that’s the same concept as with me, now writing to you from your recent past, isn’t it?

                Anyway, there you are, way over there on the other side of the divide, and here I am, still in 2015.  From our opposing viewpoints on things, you can look back at me, imagine me writing this column, right now, where I am, and, more importantly, WHEN I am, and wonder a few things that people always wonder about at the time of year you are in.  You may wonder how the year 2015 could have been different, how it could have been better.  You might think of things you did or didn’t do, and decisions you made or didn’t make, in this year that I am still in, as I write.  You may be happy that the old year is in the past; you know, the old ‘Out with old, and in with the new’, idea.  But, whatever was done with my still present year of 2015, it’s over for you now, and not one thing about it can be changed.  Nothing can be changed in whatever you did, or didn’t do, while you were here with me. I once heard one of the wisest men of our time, The Reverend Billy Graham, say about a person’s past, that, and I quote him “You cain’t unscramble eggs.”  (The ‘I’ in the word can’t is intentional, as that is how he said it.)

                 I, on the other hand, look ahead at you, and I mean straight at you, and wonder about the future.  What great things, and not so great things are YOU going to accomplish in 2016.  What person are you going to vote for and help elect to be the next President of this great land of ours? What school or church are you going to attend?  What are you really going to do with those New Year’s resolutions you made, just last week? (From your point of view.)  (I’m lucky, I haven’t even decided whether or not I will make a resolution ‘this year’… and still have a few more hours left to think about that.)  What changes might you make in your work life, home life, or your spiritual life in your brand new year?  Another sort of paraphrased quote, because I don’t know the source, simply says, “If you find yourself heading in the wrong direction, remember, God allows U-turns.”  I love that one.

                So, I will leave you now. I have to finish up whatever I’m going to do before I join you over on ‘the other side’, in that new calendar year called 2016.  Save me a spot over there, if you would.  I hope that you will please remember something else when you think about what you might do in the coming weeks, months, and years of that very precious life that you have been given.  It is one more quote, and it is a REALLY important one:   “Though no one can go back and make a brand new start, anyone can start from now and make a brand new ending.”- Carl Bard.  So, my friend, you lucky person who is actually living in ‘my future’ world of 2016… What will YOUR “brand new ending” be?  Hey, wait for me… I’ll be in 2016 with you before you know it… and in 2017 before you can even comprehend how quickly 2016 came, and then, how quickly it went. So I will say: Happy New Year! (Whatever new year it is.)

My Favorite Christmas Tradition

By G. E. Shuman

Near the end of each December my family has two celebrations. You may have guessed that one is Christmas.  Actually, and to be precise, both of them are about Christmas. My kids are grown up now, and most of them have families of their own, so, on December 25^th, we, at each of our homes, celebrate Christmas in our own way.  Then, a week or so after Christmas, we do Christmas again, all together. I love the fact that we still do that. This year the big celebration will take place at my daughter Chrissy’s home, and I am looking forward to it.  

                It’s interesting, to me, how families seem to follow their own holiday traditions, nearly to the letter, year after year.  Although things have changed somewhat in our own home, simply because so many Decembers have passed here, we still celebrate Christmas pretty much the same way every year.  The tree goes up in the same spot, with the same angel sitting at its top, and the same decorations adorning its branches, just as they have adorned the branches of so many other trees placed in that spot, during so many other Decembers, past. Christmas lights are first unwound and put on the tree, by me. Then, since my 6’8” son Andrew no longer lives here, I put the highest ornaments on it, in precisely the best spots for them. (This actually means I put them wherever Lorna tells me to put them.) We decorate our two archways, the same way, every year. On Christmas Eve Lorna still reads the Christmas story from the Bible, and then The Night Before Christmas, to whatever part of our family happens to be gathered with us in the family room that night. We still hang stockings on the fireplace mantle, and Santa, somehow, still seems to fill them before Christmas morning. In the morning we even eat the same breakfast together and begin cooking a big dinner, without many changes. A few years ago, one of my kids actually told me that our celebration was a little boring, because we always do the same things every year. Contrary to what that child’s opinion was on that particular Christmas morning, I think that family traditions are good things to have, and to keep, and in this crazy world may even provide some stability and sense of permanence for us all. In any case, Lorna and I will, likely, continue these old family ways for as many years as we can manage to do so.

                One more tradition that my family keeps nearly every year, usually at the big ‘second’ Christmas family feast, has to do with the dessert that is served after that day’s Christmas dinner.  This tradition is a special one to Lorna and to me, because, if you don’t know already, we are born again Christians, and feel strongly about the true meaning of Christmas Day. (And here I feel that I must make a confession to you, my faithful readers, even before I tell you about that special dessert.) The confession is that years ago, and for many years, in business, here in the paper, and in my personal life also, I know I downplayed the roll that my faith in God has, in my life.  It was easier to just not discuss ‘religion’ and not have to explain all of that stuff to others, no matter how real it was to me, and no matter how much I knew I should discuss it with them.  In more recent years that apprehension has simply, somehow, left me, and I am not ashamed, but proud, to have the world know of my belief in God, and of my personal faith in my Lord, Jesus Christ.  I’m in my 60s now, and at this point in life I have just received far too many blessings to ever doubt the reality of God, or to worry about what others may think, if they do not agree with me. There, I feel much better. Don’t you?

                Anyway, back to our family tradition of that special Christmas dessert. The dessert is a big cake, decorated for Christmas, and with the words ‘Happy Birthday Jesus’ spelled out on it. After all, doesn’t it make sense to celebrate Christ’s birth, in some way, on the day that has been designated to do exactly that? Some years we actually sing the birthday song for Him, and blow out the candles together.  To many people that tradition would seem really strange, if they happened to visit our celebration at that moment.  If they did visit us, we would just keep on singing, and invite them to ‘join the family’.