“Peace on earth, goodwill to all men. You have to be joking.” Charlie’s on form.
I’m visiting the EPU (elderly persons’ unit) and half a dozen of us are in the common room “looking forward” to the Christmas season. Already it’s clear that for some at least, it is a less than pleasing prospect.
“It’s all the pressure, that’s what causes the trouble … and the booze …families, never easy … too many memories, too much business …”
Christmas does seem to attract unusual tensions, with a reputation as an occasion when old family quarrels and recriminations flare up, often with the most trivial provocation.
“Trouble is, if I’m honest, we are half the problem. I mean, most of the issues are down to us, it’s a generation thing.”
“So, best stay out of it, too late to do anything about it.” Charlie again.
Later, back home, thinking, I reached an entirely different conclusion: that the context “to do anything about it” is precisely what the combination of being old and celebrating Christmas provides.
Personally, I am fairly lukewarm about the religious aspect of Christmas, about any religious aspect for that matter. However there is one phrase from the liturgies that seems to me totally apposite, a prayer that includes the plea for “time for amendment of life”. Preoccupied as they are with post-mortem, faiths view such amendment as a means of making oneself presentable to God. For me, it is an instruction for how to square the human circle.
And Christmas offers such an occasion. Amendment surely means making things right. It’s about seeking out the friends lost, the enemies made, the damage done, the wrong choices, the victims of our compromises, the broken promises, the betrayed contracts, the unresolved quarrels. Our lives, however well lived – and few are – are littered with casualties. And too many of them involve family.
It seems to me that one of the advantages we crumblies possess is perspective, the capacity to look back on past misdemeanours and understand their impact on others. The experience of revisiting the scenes of my crimes offers a sort of geriatric restorative justice, which will empower me to improve my treatment of my fellow humans. I will, hopefully, see myself as ill-advised, rather than ill-inclined, as the perpetrator of bad judgment rather than of evil intent. As silly fool not foul sinner. And capable of making repairs to myself – and my victims
Seen in this light, the upcoming family visits could be used to offer apology, to achieve closure, to mend bridges, to resolve quarrels – and senior citizens are best placed to take the lead in such a process of reconciliation. Suppose we all made Christmas an occasion for reparation. Instead of the self-glorifying round-robin letters, the trite cards with robins and shepherds, the too easy electronic greetings, in their place we offer genuine gestures of apology, of regret, of recognition of our misbehaviours.
We could do so, across the family dinner table, repairing old wounds that had remained dormant but festering in angry silence – best get the food out of the way first though! And we could do so across the net, posting expiation into the blogosphere, a public penance for past peccadillos.
Speaking strictly for myself, I would go further and suggest that in a metaphysical way, the goodwill required for such a process possesses an energy of its own, which can be “dedicated” to any number of absent “others”.
Metaphysics aside, Christmas offers a natural “time for amendment”. It might not bring peace on earth but it could create some real harmony in our homes.
