Ahhhh it's the Christmas Season!

Ahhhhh, 'tis the season for holiday cheer! The pushing, the shoving, the overpriced merchandise, the going broke buying gifts for unappreciative people, yes, it is wonderful. Okay, sorry, just a moment of aggravation. Actually I am TRYING so hard to be "merry" this year because The Tomboy has joined the National Guard and who knows where she will be next year. Or the year after that. So I want to make it as nice as possible this year even though, to tell you the truth, these past few years, I would just as soon skip the whole thing to be honest. When I think about all of it, I get tired. Just tired. But I AM trying, I really am! Maybe some day when I get grandkids some of the magic will come back. I so hope it will.

And while we are on the subject, may I just say, the whole religious thing I don't get. (Ducking from the rotten tomatoes.) Now hear me out before you get mad, I'm not knocking it, I am just saying that I don't get it because it isn't rooted in reality. I mean, Santa isn't either, but then again, Chuckie Cheese doesn't exsist, but kids love him. And if you get mad, that's okay. Again, we are free to disagree with each other. THAT is what my daughter joined the Guard to help protect. Freedom to choose what we WANT to do. And we are so lucky to live in a country where we can do that.

First of all, I don't celebrate Christmas from a religious standpoint. I don't believe that the birth of Jesus has anything to do with it. If you read the history, you will know that it doesn't. And while we are on the subject, the infant Jesus was NOT born in a barn, his parents didn't try to get into a "hotel" or "inn" as we know it today and the 3 "wise men" (who were astrologers, by the way, as in reading the star charts and making predictions; that should really piss some people off!) didn't come to that "barn" and bring him gifts. When you think about it, the whole story has been so skewed. I mean, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John couldn't even get THEIR stories straight! And they were THERE not long after it happened!

When Mary and Joseph went to Bethlehem (his home land) to be taxed (or audited/censused) they would have stayed with Joseph's family. The word "inn" refers to the "upper room" of the house in which his family lived. Houses were built with "stables" in the lower half, and then they lived on a "shelf" type residence above the stable. This helped to keep them warm since the heat from the animals would rise into the house. (But then again, so would the stench, can you IMAGINE???) Since it was the time of being taxed/audited/censused, there would have been many members of Joseph's family staying at one residence. There would have been a lot of people in town, period. Therefore, there was probably no room in the upper part of the home or "inn" as it was translated. So she would have been placed down in the stable area where they were probably already sleeping when she went into labor. "Mangers" were not the wooden "cradle" type things we see today in nativity scenes. The were built up "troughs" that ran the entire length of one wall, or they were all around the entire lower room or "stable" built out of the material from which the walls were built, which was probably some type of stucco or earth (clay, mud, etc.).

By the time the "wise men" saw the star in the east (and that star was thought to have heralded a king because they thought that every time that star appeared in the east they could trace it back to the birth of a king; again they were astrologers, which is thought to be "evil" today, lol) and traveled all those miles, do you really think they were still staying in the lower room of that house and that child was sleeping in the food trough for the animals? Ummmm, probably not. The Bible even says they came into the HOUSE where the YOUNG CHILD lay. He was probably several months old by then, and Mary & Joseph had probably found their own place to live by that time (Mary probably wasn't in any shape to travel for a while). It is possible that after the rest of Joseph's family had left the family home to return to their own homes after presenting themselves for the census, they were able to move into the upper room, and THAT may have been where the "wise men" came. But they were NOT at the "barn scene" where a baby was placed in a "cradle-like manger" after his parents had been turned away from a "hotel". It just didn't happen.

So there is your Christmas story, like it or not. Like I said, even Matthew, Mark, Luke and John couldn't agree on exactly what happened. Look it up in the best of historical books. I am NOT saying that this is all FACT. I am saying this is the most probable. And as for Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, they were telling from their perspecitive and that is fine. They certainly weren't lying, they were just telling it the way they saw it.

Now if you are Christian and you want to celebrate Christmas from a Christian standpoint, I have no problem with that. NOT AT ALL. So please don't take it that way. I just thought I would interject some history into your event.

Actually, what we now call Christmas was once a pagan ritual that signaled the end of harvest. When Christians decided they couldn't possibly celebrate it as anything other than a Christian thing, they decided to make it the celebration of the birth of Jesus. And they had a right to do that.

Again, I have NOTHING against people who celebrate it as a Christian holiday. And I am sure I will have people get all mad and think I am awful and decide to dash off some angry comment or email or whatever, and that's okay, more wars have been fought and people have killed their fellow man in the name of religion for years. As a matter of fact that is the basis for most wars. So go ahead and get mad at me, but before you do, take a deep breath and read the words at the top of this blog. You are welcome to go to YOUR blog and bad mouth and bash me all you want. Just remember, if you do that, make sure you know what you are talking about. But I don't think Christians do that, do they? Or maybe I am wrong. I don't know.

I will celebrate Christmas. I will have a tree, I will buy gifts, I will wrap them and give them away. But I will not do the whole "Jesus is the reason for the season," thing. That is just not the way we have chosen to celebrate.

However you celebrate (and it is your right to do it however you want, isn't freedom a wonderful thing?) I hope you will make this year the best one yet. You never know when it might be your last one. Make it count! And that doesn't mean expensive gifts, or spending money you don't have, it just means being with the ones you love, making it special for the children in your life, so they don't grow up to be cynical like me! Try to remember the wonder you felt when YOU were a child during this holiday. It is so magical when we are young!

At least no one was killed at a Walmart this year. I hope those people that were involved in that last year will be thinking about that. This year and from now on.

Just sayin'.