For Wilshire Baptist Church
LeAnn and I took a little road trip recently, and we may have stumbled upon a new tradition for us: a fall trip to a national park. You see, last October we did it big and went to Yosemite, and this year we decided to keep it small and stay closer to home. Only after we settled on Hot Springs, Ark., did we realize, “Hey, we’re going to a national park again. Cool!”
Time will tell if that was just a nice coincidence or if it becomes a tradition, because traditions are slippery things. When you’re in the middle of a tradition it feels like it’s been around forever, but that’s never actually the case. Traditions come and go, and they’re always changing.
Early in our marriage, LeAnn and I talked about what might become traditions for us, but we decided that traditions can’t be planned. They’re best when they come naturally by repeating something that is enjoyable or satisfying and then looking back one day and realizing it has become a tradition.
You can usually tell when a tradition is being forced because it will be described as “a new tradition” or the “first annual” whatever it is. For the record, there’s no such thing as a “first annual” something. You do something once and if it goes well, you do it again, and then it becomes the “second annual,” and if you keep doing it, then maybe it becomes a tradition.
But even then, traditions don’t last forever and they certainly don’t stay the same. Wilshire’s annual Thanksgiving dinner was held at noon this year rather than in the evening, which had been the tradition for a good number of years. From what I’ve heard it worked out great, so noon may be the new tradition—or it may change again.
We weren’t there because we broke our own Wilshire tradition and attended the annual Thanksgiving dinner at South Garland Baptist Church where LeAnn and her parents were charter members. After the meal, there was a wonderful time of sharing as members told stories from their 47-year history as a church. But often a story would begin with the words, “Remember when we used to have,” and they’d describe an event or practice that had gone away.
I had a troubling convergence of traditions in October when three fell on one day: a decades-old annual family reunion, a 108th annual college homecoming celebration, and a 40th high school reunion. I couldn’t do all three and so I chose part of one. It’s a good sign of the strength of a tradition that it doesn’t depend on the attendance of one particular person. I can report that the family and high school reunions went fine without me.
We’re entering a season where the calendar is full of traditions in the name of Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s. Some are longstanding and some are fresh. Some will go on for years and some will evolve, be replaced or will end. It can be a wonderful time but also a stressful time if we work too hard to uphold a tradition that may have seen its day or is simply impossible to maintain.
Years ago, when my sister died, my parents struggled with what to do that first Christmas without her. I recall hearing talk about a trip away from home, but in the end, they made the hard but good decision to stay home and just do it like we’d always done it.
For my first Christmas in my first marriage, we tried to keep our family traditions intact by spending Christmas Eve with her family and Christmas Day with mine. It was a bold effort, but the 300 miles between the two homes made it too difficult to repeat. We tried the alternating Christmas and Thanksgiving dance, but that didn’t always work with siblings getting married and having families of their own. Eventually our tradition would be that we’d just try to see everyone sometime between Thanksgiving and New Year’s.
In my new life with LeAnn we’ve enjoyed the close proximity of parents that has allowed us all to gather in one place for Thanksgiving and Christmas meals. This year we’ll be missing LeAnn’s father at the table. The tradition has changed but it will go on in a new way.
It’s easy to get swept up by a tradition and make it the object of the season when it is actually just a way to package the season. A big Thanksgiving spread with all the right people at the table is not Thanksgiving; it is a way we give thanks. A tree decorated just right and a perfectly choreographed gift exchange is not Christmas; those are just ways we celebrate the birth of Christ. There are other ways to give thanks, other ways to worship the Christ child.
The best holiday tradition may be a personal one that we can practice within ourselves: to have a spirit that embraces new experiences and a heart that welcomes new people to our tables.