Dear Bootie and Arthur,

                Merry First Christmas! You might be wondering why your older sister has sent you a creche on your first Christmas together as a married couple, especially since I have shown no particular religious proclivities in the past. Let me explain. I wanted to do for you what Mom and Dad did for me on my first Christmas after getting married. They sent us a terra cotta creche, and I have always treasured it mainly because it reminds me of the creche we had growing up. Getting out the creche every year always marked the real beginning of the Christmas season for me as a child, and no matter where we were—Colorado, St. Louis or Philadelphia—what never changed was the creche that Aunt Betty made for mom and dad. I always thought the figures were beautifully simple and full of grace—made of clay or porcelain that Aunt Betty glazed with a simple brown bisque to highlight the folds in the garments and other features. To me they captured at once the humility of the moment and its momentousness.

I also have fond memories of how each of us would rearrange the figures according to our own interpretation of Christ’s birth. I favored what I liked to think of as a progressive model with the wise men and shepherds initially far away from the central scene. Each day that it got closer to Christmas, I would move them slightly closer to Jesus, Mary and Joseph. I also liked grouping them, keeping the animals with the shepherds, the wisemen together, and positioning Mary closest to Jesus, with Joseph nearby but not as close, because, well, he didn’t really have that much to do with the whole thing anyway. But my careful schema would always be upset by one of my siblings who had a completely different vision or interpretation. I remember that Melissa’s was perhaps the most radical, and yet completely in keeping with her worldview. She would carefully place all of the animals closest to the baby Jesus, and all of the humans were banished to the far reaches of the table, scattered in no particular order as far as I could tell. For Melissa, only animals could comfort a baby brought into such a harsh world, a world desperately in need of salvation. I suspect she still holds that view today. I am sure that you and Darin had your own visions too. I remember that most days leading up to Christmas the figures on the creche would be moved multiple times, one person coming in and rearranging, only to have another person rearrange the rearrangement half an hour later. No one person’s vision was wrong—none of us was there, after all. Each person’s vision was just different—unique to him or her. With all of that movement and handling, our creche never collected dust—like the story of the leather-bound Bible that stays supple with the oil from all of the fingers touching it. The creche was the most active space of the Christmas decorations, and perhaps the biggest Christmas miracle of all was that all of the figures remained intact, never chipped or broken. Then again, Aunt Betty made the creche, and she never made anything that wasn’t built to withstand the ravages of time.

So I set out to find you and Arthur a creche worthy of those memories. Let me tell you, it wasn’t easy. I had no trouble finding elaborately painted creches with lots of fake gold. But I wanted something like what we had growing up, so those wouldn’t do. I also rejected the creche made out of fake marshmallows with each figure standing or placed on what looked like a little graham cracker pedestal. The whole thing seemed to suggest that Jesus would eventually sacrifice himself to become the marshmallow center of a s’more. There was also a five-piece “Heart of Christmas Mice Nativity Set” with “two festive mice dressed up with their cute baby playing baby Jesus,” complete with “the mouse angel wishing you all the best this holiday season.” So--in the “heart of Christmas” there are—mice? I don’t think even Melissa would have approved of a creche made out of stone resin rodents. There were “minimalist” creches where the figures had no faces, and creches that looked suspiciously like the Fisher Price Little People sets kids play with. There were nesting doll creches with Jesus fitting inside Mary, who fit inside Joseph, and so on—this seemed wrong for all sorts of reasons. There was a puzzle creche where every piece fit into the frame of the manger, but this meant that everything had to go in the exact same place, which seemed out of keeping with our family tradition of intense sibling rivalry regarding figure placement. There were lots of creches that seemed to operate on the principle that Jesus would have really liked glitter, and the more glitter, the more holy he would be. I mention all of these only so you can appreciate what you could have gotten instead of the enclosed, which was the most tasteful creche I could find given my budget of $5 (just kidding—it was more than $5, but it was on sale).

I just learned from Mom that Aunt Betty made our family creche when she was hospitalized and struggling with a deep depression. I know that was a very dark period in her life. I’d like to think making our creche might have had something to do with her recovery. But I am glad to know this now because it reminds us that out of darkness can come an unexpected light, and after despair can come great joy. That is perhaps the most miraculous part of this story--the essence of grace and all that this season is meant to inspire. Aunt Betty probably had no idea how much that gift meant to us and how many memories it would provide, and it means even more now.

So as you embark on this new phase in your life, I hope this creche will have a place in the new memories that you create around the holidays, and carry with it as well the many fond memories we shared growing up. 

 

Love,

Bossy