Every year Christmas comes to Christendom in unerring certainty. Symbolized by Christ child, Christmas is for children. However, this red letters day is likewise shared by the elders, for amongst them, there would always be the feeling and thoughts of childhood and the children in them.
Christmas, to many of us, is the storehouse of our memories in our age of innocence annually recovered in nostalgic ritual and reminiscent thoughts. The elders of today were the children of yesterday, and as children before, and they viewed Christmas as a symbol of good, and considered that love for others would endure.
When we were young in the somnolent barrio nestled in the natural elegance and charm of the forested hills, we knew that Christmas would come in perfect certainty. By the approach of December, we could feel and sniff the pure cool air, as the night would become longer. By the roadsides and gardens, red poinsettias leaves would appear, a placid acceptance of children’s granite faith that Christmas was surely on the way.
In the cold early morning, the barrio would be at times enveloped by misty fog only to dissipate when the first streak of morning would come. During the yuletide season, the sky would always be covered with a thin spread of clouds as if it would rain, but it was only nature’s way of screening the searing rays of the tropical sun making the barrio climate ideal for work and enjoyment.
As we walked to the barrio school with joyous delight, we felt for the first time that the whole place was clothed in arcadian beauty. The leaves of the trees seemed to glisten with the cool breeze fanned our tanned faces.
The anticipation of Christmas would change our outlook on what we used to see a thousand times. We would notice the radiance of moonlight, and the grass around suffused with vaporous moist in the morning. We would get the thorny holy vines growing the ponds for decoration together with the small colourful lanterns we made for classroom décor.
December as I recollect would always be harvest time. We could smell the fragrance of the ripening grains in the field, as crew of workers would arrive for the big harvest. There would also be bullock carts filled with out of town native crafts, which could be bought for cash or barter.
The early Misa de Gallo would usher the countdown of Christmas, that in nine days, it would be Christmas day. The young and old and the many children would brave the early morning to attend the church service. After each mass, the children knew that Christmas would be a day nearer.
The ninth Misa de Gallo would be moved earlier, about eleven on the night of the eight-day, the 24th of December. That mass on Christmas Eve, called misa cantata, would be long and would end exactly on midnight birth of the Christ child. As if borne by the wind of Christmas, we, the children would rush home to greet our folks and enjoy the goodies waiting for us.
On Christmas day, we would wear our best clothes and visit our close relatives, or ninongs and ninangs, kiss their hands and in return, we would be given goodies, fruits, and at times coins. In a group, we would have luncheon in the house where we would be overtaken by noontime. But with so many goodies we had eaten, we could have enjoyed the enticing food on the Christmas table.
Before twilight, we would be home tired but well fed and happy and straight to bed.
Today, the bliss of Christmas has not changed in the barrio of old but people did change. The market economy has commercialized everything in the daily life of people. Money or what it can buy had changed people reminding me of the old Arab proverb that says,” Money is Magic”.
But Christmas, to me, is still the real magic.