The Spirits of All Three

Scrooge at one of our performances of Dickens' story

At the end of Dickens' A CHRISTMAS CAROL, Scrooge vows, "I will live in the past, present and the future. The spirits of all three shall strive within me." I'm not sure I ever truly thought about what this meant until last night. We had our annual Christmas Carol party and reading, a tradition for more than 20 years in our home. During the party, our small house is stuffed with guests who join together in reading a one-hour scripted version of Dickens' story. The party functions as a merry rehearsal of sorts for when we perform it at local residential care facilities.  A few hours before this year's party, my husband and I attended a Memorial Service. At the party, we heard about the death of a friend. And all through the evening, memories of past parties and past performances were layered over every moment.

The spirit of Christmas Past - friends and loved ones no longer with us, the children who were Tiny Tims and have now gone off to college, the years we did 14 performances, the years snow prevented even one, the era of performing the story at the local AIDS hospice until one day it was no longer necessary, and so many more. Every phrase I've just written is connected like a fine gold filament to a deep, rich, true story woven into my heart - some joyful, some wrenching, and I wouldn't trade a single one.

The spirit of Christmas Present - embodied in every friend who came to celebrate with us last night, new faces and familiar faces, the laughter and conversation and food and drink, the preparations, the last lingering musings late into the night, even the clean-up - as well as the many moments of human connection this week with my students at school, my colleagues, my friends and family near and far. Again - not all of it happy, but all of it so real and true and enriching in the best sense of the word.

The spirit of Christmas Future - the knowledge of mortality, which becomes ever more real with each passing year, as friends and family shuffle off this mortal coil. Scrooge's redemption doesn't mean he won't die. We all die. Dickens' Christmas Future is frightening, yes, and yet Scrooge says he will live with that spirit, too, and it is that spirit, that awareness of how "any spirit working kindly in its little sphere will find its mortal life too short," that ultimately brings about Scrooge's fullest change of heart and his commitment to a different path.

We are here on this earth for but a blink of the divine eye. Most of us don't consciously carry that knowledge of impending mortality with us all the time. It's too much too bear. It must be tempered by the spirits of Past and Present. But it must be somewhere in our minds and hearts, for it drives us, too. It drives us to remember what truly matters. What legacy do we wish to leave? How do we wish to be remembered? How shall we live while we are here? Will we connect with our fellow human beings? Will we honor and cherish what we learn from our past, embrace our present regardless of our circumstances, and be cognizant of our future?

Scrooge doesn't say the spirits of all three will co-exist peacefully, mind you. He says they will strive within him. Miriam Webster defines strive as "struggle in opposition" or "endeavor." I think "struggle in opposition" fits here. The three spirits contend with one another, and out of that struggle comes a potent energy for good. It's very much in keeping with the Christianity I know and love, a religion born out of struggle, a religion in which sorrow and joy, death and rebirth, God and man commingle. It is Jacob wrestling with the angel.

Long live the power of struggle! May the spirits of past, present and future strive within all of us to drive our best selves and illuminate all that it means to be human.

"I am a mortal, and liable to fall."

Scrooge and Christmas Past, in performance

When in Dickens' classic Ebenezer Scrooge is visited by the first of the three spirits, the Ghost of Christmas past, and the spirit beckons him toward the window, he is reluctant. "I am a mortal, and liable to fall," he says. And the spirit responds "Bear but a touch of my hand and you shall be upheld in more than this." I've always focused on the spirit's response, but this Christmas season, I've found myself noticing Scrooge's words and their wider meaning.

Like Scrooge, I am a mortal, and liable to fall. We all are, all the way back to Genesis. We humans are liable to fall. In fact, you might argue that it's what we do best. It's part of what separates us from angels and from God in fully divine form. We are so liable to fall that, in the days of the Old Testament, we made it a regular point to make offerings and sacrifices to God to make up for all our falling. And somewhere along the way, God decided enough was enough. We were so liable to fall that we really needed something much more powerful to bridge the eternal gap between the infallible divine and ourselves. Hence, Jesus.

When the angels fall, they get a full-fledged and eternal punishment. We humans are given ways to make up for all our screw-ups. Why? Maybe it's because since God created us, he's pretty aware of our essential nature, and part of our essential nature is that we're liable to fall. The point of interest is how we respond, and how God responds, when we fall. He knows it's in our nature, and so he's prepared to forgive.

If only we could accept our essential nature more in the same spirit that God does. If only we could stop trying to be perfect on our own and accept that we are neither God nor angels nor demons. We are mortals, liable to fall, and the power lies in reaching out for the divine hand, in whatever form it is extended to us.

Keeping Christmas In Your Heart

In honor of the season, here are a few of my favorite quotes from the Dickens classic A CHRISTMAS CAROL.  They say what needs to be said better than I ever could, or would wish to.

picture by jholbo

There are many things from which I might have derived good, by which I have not profited, I dare say ... Christmas among the rest.  But I am sure I have always thought of Christmas time ... as a good time: a kind, forgiving, charitable, pleasant time: the only time I know of, in the long calendar of the year, when men and women seem by one consent to open their shut-up hearts freely, and to think of people below them as if they really were fellow-passengers to the grave, and not another race of creatures bound on other journeys.  And therefore, uncle, though it has never put a scrap of gold or silver in my pocket, I believe that it has done me good and will do me good and I say God bless it!

                                                        - Scrooge's nephew Fred

Business! Mankind was my business.  The common welfare was my business.  Charity, mercy, forbearance and benevolence were all my business.  The dealings of my trade were but a drop of water in the comprehensive ocean of my business.

                                  - Marley's Ghost

This boy is Ignorance.  This girl is Want.  Beware them both, and all of their degree, but most of all beware this boy, for on his brow I see that written which is Doom, unless the writing be erased.  Deny it! ... Slander those who tell it ye!  Admit it for your factious purposes and make it worse!  And bide the end!

                                  - The Ghost of Christmas Present 

 

The Case Against Being Solitary as an Oyster

One of my all-time favorite holiday stories is A CHRISTMAS CAROL and I'm a purist.  I'm not a big fan of updated, modernized takes on the Dickens tale, because Dickens' language is just too magnificent.  Today, a phrase from Dickens was sticking in my mind, the first description of Scrooge, in which, among other things, Dickens says he is "solitary as an oyster."  What a great metaphor!  Closed up so tight nothing can get in or out without effort, prying, muscle, possibly killing the thing inside in order to retrieve its pearl.

This phrase came to my mind as I wrestled with the heavy oppression of dysthemia which hits me on and off especially as the darkness takes over and the sunlight grows scarce.  When my depression hits, I feel overwhelmingly alienated from others, like I can't fit in and should never even try.  The sense of disconnection is like being on a fog-shrouded island, all alone.  And the effort to reach out and connect with fellow human beings seems like climbing a mountain.  It is all too easy in this state of mind to self-isolate, to become, like Scrooge, as "solitary as an oyster."

But the lesson of Dickens' story is the power of human connection, the over-riding essential value of that connection, of remembering that we are, as Scrooge's nephew Fred puts it, "fellow travelers" on the journey.  Sometimes, when you least want that connection is when you most need it.  Lucky for me, I have a husband who understands this, and, more importantly, understands it about me.  He often reminds me of this lesson at critical moments.  So, as I rounded out my week, even though the grey fog was pulling me down, I made the conscious effort to connect, with my students and with my colleagues. It was worth the struggle.

If you, like me, find yourself on the fog-shrouded island at this time of year, I encourage you to reach out, no matter hard that might be.  Fight the urge to be as solitary and shut-up as an oyster.  An oyster's treasure is only revealed when it's open.