A Little Bit of Christmas
In the big lounge room of our apartment building, where I’m alone at my favorite table, a 12-foot Christmas tree glows in the still of early morning and watches me read. The tree is green, lights tiny and white, ornaments silver and blue. Maybe it’s the predawn hour, which animates any bit of magic, that draws my attention to a humble ornament, the smallest, least egotistical ball on the tree, relegated last month by two earnest, well-meaning staffers to a position low at the back.
This tiny soldier of joy gathers what light it can and becomes something more beautiful than it was when hidden in a cardboard box. It waits for someone to notice. Its matte surface lacks the sexy, specular highlights of its showier tree mates and cannot exude the creamy sheen of satin-surface ornaments – that certain glow that bewitches so many a dreamy eye. Some might, cruelly, call this undersized Christmas ball dull.
Nevertheless, this little fellow plays its part capably. It tones down the spectacle of the tree in one place so other ornaments can dazzle the season away. It absorbs more light than it returns, which can’t be easy. It whispers its message, dialing down the noise of your mind, drawing out your patience, bringing you gently to a place of quiet contemplation, asking you to be, for a moment, free of judgment and open to the spirit of wonder. That’s a pretty good Christmas gift.
Guy D. Johnson is a writer and marketing communications professional. Previously an animation studio owner, daily newspaper editor, reporter and photographer, volunteer fireman, railroad bridge gang helper, FM radio station underling and cave guide. He has lived on farmland trusted to the sun and rain; atop a wooded hill; beside great rivers; upon an arid, high plateau; and at the subtropical coast of the Gulf of Mexico. For 20 years, he worked and wrote in New Orleans.