From Despair to the Hope that Only Christmas Can Bring

This article is a reprint from a column I pen each month for the website of my high school class www.DanMccarty70.com.  While it has been over four decades since the 400+ of us exploded from the halls of Dan McCarthy High and into our lives, today over 250 of us still meet on a regular basis in cyberspace to remember, smile and stay in touch.  I hope you enjoy my Ramblings.

From Despair to the Hope that Only Christmas Can Bring

“I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day”

With the horror of the Sandy Hook elementary school massacre still fresh in our minds, and only days before Christmas, it leaves all of us a bit shaken and wondering what is happening to our world?

During our barefoot childhood, running the washboard sand roads of Ft. Pierce, the thought of a school shooting never crossed our mind.  Schools were bastions of safety, and the thought of someone hurting us in that innocent environment was all but absurd.  Doors were not only unlocked but many times left wide open.  In high school, we walked freely to the parking lot to fill a car with six or eight laughing pals as we freely drove off campus, music blaring, for a lunch of dogs steamed in beer at Lums, or greasy burgers at South Dixie or Bills Burger.  Never was there the slightest thought that evil could be waiting upon our return.

But, that was then and this is now.  Life has certainly changed – some for the best and some not so.  In our short lifetime, we have seen much come and go. We have seen airplanes turn from props to jets and, in the process, go from luxury travel to cattle cars; seen the birth and subsequent explosion of the Internet; discovered thousands of new ways to kill one another; watched the Berlin Wall go up and come down; seen phones go from party lines to palm-sized computers. We’ve seen Tickle Tummy Hill shrink, and the Sunrise Theater go from everyone’s favorite make-out spot to the spot to hear everyone’s favorite aging rock band.

Some things are gone, never to return—drive-in theaters, trick-or-treating, the cross atop the St. Cloud water tower, and some would say modesty and civility, at least during political campaigns and all year round inside the DC Beltway. Of course, our alma mater McCarty High is gone forever, along with the safety its students felt nestled in shelter of its classrooms.

As difficult as it is for me to believe, today, Christmas even seems in danger of being lost. I wonder what Christmas in America will look like in the year 2050. I dare say that our grandkids will not see the same Christmas we grew up loving—one with Nativity scenes, an angel atop the “Christmas” tree, and carolers singing such radical songs as “Come All Ye Faithful” and “O, Little Town of Bethlehem.” I wonder if we as a country, losing the Christmas of our youth may be in some way linked to the type of violence we now find manifesting itself in the most unlikely of places like Sandy Hook.

Today, all this is in danger of going the way of longboards and Senior Skip Day, all for political correctness and fear that someone within earshot might disagree with the Christmas message and, God forbid, is offended. America, it seems, has forsaken the wishes of the majority for the few.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I do not feel I have the right to hurt others’ feelings intentionally. But, for the life of me, I do not know how my Christmas tree, manger scene, or Christmas carol can offend anyone, unless he or she is trying to be offended.

I remember the joy of my childhood Christmases and still strive to enjoy Christmas and spread the spirit of Christmas any way I can. I believe it is worth the time and effort to do so. If not for Jeff Foxworthy and all those redneck jokes, I would be tempted to leave my Christmas lights up year round. Alas, I already talk like a hick, and the lights up in June would seal my Southern redneck fate.

But as we age, our kids and now grandkids grow up and move on to living their lives, and as more and more of our friends and family go home before us, it can make getting in the Christmas spirit more difficult than it was just a few decades ago, even without 24/7 TV coverage of another school shooting. The trick is to try. Get up, turn off CNN and Fox News and just try to take in a deep breath of the spirit we call Christmas. Just as we have to work at other things in our life—family communications, earning a living, being patience, losing weight, and the list goes on—we to must work harder at letting into our heart the wonderful spirit of Christmas. We must understand that, with that spirit, we lay ourselves vulnerable to painful memories and our less than perfect traits and those of others.

It might be helpful when trying to rekindle that elusive Christmas spirit to see what we still have to be thankful for, by comparison.

As a writer, I love to read of the lives of other writers. As Christmas 2012 steadily approaches, I am reminded of one of my favorite American poets, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. It seems old Hank kept a diary, and each Christmas, he would write all he had to be thankful for. He did this year after year. Of course, he, like us all, had difficult times in his life.
While on a trip to Europe, his first wife Mary died during a miscarriage. Henry sent her body back to Cambridge for later burial and continued his journey in the fog of depression that brought him near suicide. His hope was that the travel might lessen his pain.

Relief finally came but, with it, a new form of suffering. A coincidental meeting in the Swiss Alps brought him together with the affluent Appleton family of Boston, which was when he first met and almost immediately fell in love with the Appleton daughter, Frances (Fanny). Fanny Appleton became the great love of Henry’s life, but she did not return his affections for more than seven years. Each of those years, he faithfully added his entries to his Christmas diary.

Longfellow’s acclaim and his persistence finally paid off, and Fanny accepted Henry’s marriage proposal. The couple married in 1843 with Fanny eventually giving birth to six children. So much for turning a no into a resounding yes—way to go, Hank. Longfellow settled in to a happy life grinding out one literary masterpiece after another and his Christmas journal entries.

The later and diminished phase of Longfellow's writing career began with the heartbreaking death of his beloved Fanny. She had cut the hair of their youngest daughter and was sealing the hair in a memory envelope using melted sealing wax when the candle she was using caught her dress on fire. With women’s clothing of the day bound tightly, layered, and made of a gauzy material, she was quickly ablaze from head to toe. Henry, napping in the other room, was awakened by their daughter’s screams and attempted to smother the fire using a rug on the parlor floor. He sustained severe burns on his hands, arms, and face. His attempt to save his wife was to no avail, and Fanny died the next day. The wooly beard he grew in his later years was to cover the facial scars.

A mere month after his beloved Fanny's death, on August 18, 1861, he offered voice to his anguish in a note to Mary Appleton Mackintosh, Fanny’s sister. He wrote, "How I am alive after what my eyes have seen, I know not. I am at least patient, if not resigned; and thank God hourly—as I have from the beginning—for the beautiful life we led together, and that I loved her more and more to the end." Even at the height of his misery, he found something to be thankful for. This, too, went in his journal in 1861.

I am hopeful, that once the cutting edge of loss begins its slow and painful healing process, the families of the 26 lost at Sandy Hook can also celebrate the time, although too short, which they were blessed with.  Speaking as the grandpa who has lost a grandbaby at age 2 ½, I know firsthand that the pain will eventually subside and the memories of the time you had with your cherished baby will, one day, again bring a smile to your face; a smile of the way things were.

The same year of Fanny's death, the Civil War began, and in 1863, Charley, Longfellow's son, left without his dad’s permission and joined the Union army. During the war, Henry was called to Washington twice to care for Charles—once because of illness and the second in 1863 because of battle injuries sustained at Gettysburg as he fought along with the Massachusetts 20th. By Christmas 1863, his son’s injuries were still serious and thought still life-threatening.

On Christmas morning, 1863, as the American poet and abolitionist rose early in his Cambridge, Massachusetts, home, depressed by his son’s injuries and concerned at the slow and costly pace of the war, he heard a jubilant rhapsody from the bells in the nearby church belfry. He was overcome with emotion as he considered his and his nation’s state of affairs. Burdened with these feelings, he turned to paper and ink. In his bedroom near a warm fireplace, he wrote the poem “I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day.” As he poured his heart through the pen to waiting paper, he was immersed in the pealing of the church bells. Longfellow, a devout Christian, later said that he was drawn to the Bible where he found God’s promise in the second chapter of Luke that the tolling of the bell seemed to underscore “Peace on Earth, goodwill to men!”

While the words flowed into what was destined to become an American literary classic and eventually a popular Christmas carol, Longfellow’s despair can still be read in the line, “and in despair I bowed my head… there is no peace on Earth, I said… for hate is strong and mocks the song of Peace on Earth, goodwill to men.”

To hear this powerful Christmas carol http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M7670CXvPX0

This line concisely pronounces the national sadness that engulfed the North and South alike. Still, it took two more full years to end the bloody war. But even in one of the worst eras of our country, with his heart laden heavy with the sorrow of a wounded son, a crippled nation, and the loss of his cherished wife, Longfellow could still find the spirit of Christmas.

Longfellow’s son Charles survived, and ultimately, America returned to peace and, eventually, prosperity. Longfellow’s “I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day” poem that mourned the death of peace was printed in most newspapers nationwide beginning in 1867.

Although I have no way of knowing for sure, I bet that old Henry would be most surprised to know this poem written during some of his and his nation’s darkest days has become a beloved Christmas carol.

Maybe in this lies the real reason that this powerful poem has become a staple during this Christmas season, known for the renewal of hope and peace. For it matters little how fierce the ill winds blow across this great nation, we, as a people, hope that each Christmas will bring peace to our hearts and to our country.

I am sure the families of those slain at Sandy Hook can today relate to those Longfellow lines; “and in despair I bowed my head… there is no peace on Earth, I said… for hate is strong and mocks the song of Peace on Earth, goodwill to men.”  But, while today those words can seem all too true, we each have the power to light a single candle that can do its small part to replace despair with hope – the hope of peace.  The hope of turning back the pages of time to a place and time we all once enjoyed; a time that a warm Christmas spirit engulfed a sleepy costal community known as Ft. Pierce and we, with the innocence of a child, began our journey without fear of the evil of the world.  And if one candle can pierce that darkness, what could a candle held high by all of us do?

So, whereas the world might wish you a politically correct “Happy Holidays” while drinking their low-fat eggnog and lighting their “holiday” tree, my family and I will stand proudly and wish you each a very Merry Christmas as we place the angel atop our traditional Christmas tree while always remembering the true reason for this most joyous of seasons.
May this Christmas bring you the peace and love you deserve and may you not rest until you have found a way to share it with another.
Merry Christmas, my friends, and Happy 2013.

Keepin’ the Spirit (Christmas Spirit) Alive

Richard Parker