Christmas Eve 

Christmas Eve

We are used to a quiet Christmas; most of our relatives are out West.

We let our 13-year old son open his "main" gift: PS 2. I gather he is enjoying it. We'll all open stockings and other stuff tomorrow.

This is the only time of year I find myself wanting more church in my life. For a few years I took our son to a carol-singing service in an old Anglican church on Christmas Eve. He stopped wanting to go, and I didn't want to go without him.

So I just played a few carols for my own enjoyment on an electronic keyboard we have.

I guess I'm the classic example of someone who grew up Protestant, church on Sunday, with both the Christmas and Easter seasons especially important; and now, very little church at all.

I'm struck, like so many other people, that concerts at public school are either secular or "open to diversity," with old-fashioned Christianity the one thing for which there seems to be no room. I'd like to at least hear the old carols once a year.

Of course there are now hundreds of secular or pop "Xmas songs," and the lite FM stations play them for about six weeks. That drives me up the wall, and I get sick of songs even if I once thought they were OK.

Besides the old carols, I like slightly bluesy or melancholy Christmas music. I like the music from "Charlie Brown Christmas," although I wish there were more of it. I like Wynton Marsalis' "We Three Kings."

Merry Christmas, everyone.