A Christmas Carol Sings to Me Because, as a storyteller, I long to decode its secret. I need to know why it has remained the narrative star it is for so very long with such a vast audience. What exactly did Charles Dickens create that keeps us coming back year after year to be absorbed yet again by this tale?
A Christmas Carol Sings to Me Because, of course, the thing Charles Dickens created that holds us in his thrall is Ebenezer Scrooge. This character commands us to revisit the dark environs of his “money-changing hole” with astonishingly universal regularity. We simply cannot get enough of his story and the twisting trail it leads us along.
A Christmas Carol Sings to Me Because it is essentially a ghost story, filled with things that go bump in the night, most literally, in Scrooge’s case. In the old Alistair Sim film version, which I favor, the gloomy black and white medium, the booming apocalyptic sound effects, Ebenezer’s perpetual scowl. All of it draws me back again year after “rolling year.”
A Christmas Carol Sings to Me Because, all of the above not withstanding, at an essential center of my heart, I am Ebenezer Scrooge. Not because I am a miser of my worldly goods or a dour declarer of “Humbug this” and “Humbug that.” But because of a wound I carry, which Ebenezer also carries, and many others of us carry as well.
A Christmas Carol Sings to Me Because, as a human being on the path of my life in this world, there is a wound in my heart. It is a deep hole, bored by the continual dropping of hot coals of malice or neglect onto that spot when I was very young. This hollow place begs, every day in every way, to be filled, and the only way to fill it is with love. But this love must be received and absorbed, and the problem is that the heart surrounding the wound has been singed by those hot coals into believing itself unlovable.
A Christmas Carol Sings to Me Because I am certain many of us have been similarly singed by similar hot coals. I don’t ask anyone to admit that, because to do so makes us painfully vulnerable. Please, don’t think it necessary to point out how you are not in the least wounded. If this is true, I rejoice for you and pray for you to remain ever so. I suspect, however, that, more often than not, we have, almost all of us, been carrying our wounds and bearing up under them for decades on end.
A Christmas Carol Sings to Me Because Ebenezer offers us an answer. He points us toward a road to take to a place where healing can happen, and that place is within ourselves, within each of our hearts. Action is required, of course, as is always the case where redemption stories are concerned, and Scrooge’s story is about redemption for sure. That action is love, in its active verb form. Please, indulge me if I now relate that call to action to myself.
A Christmas Carol Sings to Me Because it reminds me that, in order to stop feeling unloved, I must love, everybody and everything, as deeply and as constantly as I possibly can. The place inside me that instinctively recognizes truth knows this to be right and good. Love. Love. Love. Love. Love. I pray I will be able to do that. And I wish you all a maximally beloved and loving New Year. Alice Orr – www.aliceorrbooks.com
RR
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I so much endorse your proclamation that we need to share love in order to fill our empty holes. God bless you with all of the love that I and the whole world can muster.
Well Duane. You and Sarah are certainly prime examples of sharing love. With each other and with all of us who are so blessed to know you. Love. Alice
I seem to have neglected to answer your message Dear Dwayne. I apologize for that. Thus I am commenting on a Christmas post as we begin the trek of Lent toward Easter. in any season, you and Sarah are certainly prime examples of sharing love. With each other and with all of us who are so blessed to know you. Love. Alice
Dear Duane. You have commented on my blog posts in the past. I invite you to explore my most recent series. It is titled “Oh No I’m a Caregiver – Dementia – Our Cautionary Story.” These posts are of special significance to me. Dementia appears to be a reality destined to assault all of our lives in one way or another eventually. I believe that the story I have to tell – through my initial post and others yet to come at https://www.aliceorrbooks.com – has valuable insights to offer. For this reason, I hope you will read it and pass it on to others so that they might benefit from what I am learning and from those insights.
For example… My husband Jonathan, who has recently been diagnosed with dementia, is actually quite fine at this early stage. He is engaged in lots of cognitively powerful activities. He writes original memoir pieces that are very good and says this is the result of sitting in on so many of my writing workshops over the past forty-five years. He now finds more joy in writing than the drawing and music that were his usual creative pursuits in the past. This is good because, as you know, portraying characters and composing scenes require a deep level of focus and detail concentration which is very beneficial for him. He also loves jigsaw puzzling – the 1500-piece variety. Again much concentration is required plus he has fond memory associations of doing puzzles with his mom when he was a boy. He also reads a lot – challenging books, as well as his favorite New York Times articles. He does regular physical exercise and has also begun gardening at our church which has a large planted space in sore need of attention. Medically, he is taking a basic drug that has disappeared his brain fog for the timebeing. We also have excellent medical professionals on our team and on our side.
Dementia is not like the tv commercials portray it to be. Their purpose is to ramp up fear and sell very expensive, very dangerous drugs. There is a long, gradual period before extreme changes begin, and the aggressiveness these ads emphasize can often be mitigated with simple mood medications that are harmless and affordable.
Meanwhile, there is a real-life story to be told here of real-life experience. I hope you will read and share it. Dementia is a reality for many of us and, unfortunately, promises to be a reality for many more. Truth is our best armor against being cast into despair by the prospect. I hope to add a little to that sustaining truth. Dementia is one of the many ways all of us will evolve from this life into whatever may lay beyond. Passing on is our universal destiny. Some of those passages involve discomfort and unpleasantness. We can perhaps be a bit better prepared if we understand realistically what to expect.
That is what our story – Jonathan’s and mine – is meant to do. Help others – in an honest and caring fashion – to be prepared. Love and Blessings. Alice
Dickens always had the key to human nature. Your essay pinpoints the reasons why. You are, indeed, a wise woman Alice.
Happy New Year and many more books to you.
A Christmas Carol sings to me for a lot of the reasons you already know, but also because my mom and I always watched the Alistair Sim version together when I was growing up, usually while we trimmed the tree. My dad always did the lights, (remember those light strings that went totally dark when one bulb went out?) and some of the tinsel, because he was anal about the placement with one end slightly lower than the other, but mom and I did the rest, usually on my birthday. And maybe drinking blameless alcohol free eggnog and eating Christmas cookies, which we had laboriously baked and decorated. That’s the song that A Christmas Carol sings to me.
Dearest Ellen. Yes, I remember those light strings and the tinsel that had to be placed two strands at a time, never tossed. Heaven forbid any tossing. My happy yuletide memories are mostly with my son. Mom, most likely manic depressive, tended to perpetrate crises at Christmas. But I made up for that with Eddie, including cookies and eggnog, which I sorely miss since it’s been deducted from my diet. Plus we had a video of the Sim version that probably scared Eddie, now that I think about it. Later, with the grandkids, I read the book aloud, as it put them to sleep. So much to recall and cherish. Thank you for further jogging my memory bone as you so often do. Bless you dear friend and Happy New Year. Alice
Dear Ellen. You have commented on my blog posts in the past. Maybe you could take a look at my most recent series. It is titled “Oh No I’m a Caregiver – Dementia – Our Cautionary Story.” These posts are of special significance to me. Dementia appears to be a reality destined to assault all of our lives in one way or another eventually. I believe that the story I have to tell – through my initial post and others yet to come at https://www.aliceorrbooks.com – has valuable insights to offer. For this reason, I hope you will read it and pass it on to others so that they might benefit from what I am learning and from those insights.
As you well know, my husband Jonathan was recently been diagnosed with dementia. He is actually quite fine at this early stage. He is engaged in lots of cognitively powerful activities. He writes original memoir pieces that are very good and says this is the result of sitting in on so many of my writing workshops over the past forty-five years. He now finds more joy in writing than the drawing and music that were his usual creative pursuits in the past. This is good because, as you know, portraying characters and composing scenes require a deep level of focus and detail concentration which is very beneficial for him. He also loves jigsaw puzzling – the 1500-piece variety. Again much concentration is required plus he has fond memory associations of doing puzzles with his mom when he was a boy. He also reads a lot – challenging books, as well as his favorite New York Times articles. He does regular physical exercise and has also begun gardening at our church which has a large planted space in sore need of attention. Medically, he is taking a basic drug that has disappeared his brain fog for the timebeing. We also have excellent medical professionals on our team and on our side.
Dementia is not like the tv commercials portray it to be. Their purpose is to ramp up fear and sell very expensive, very dangerous drugs. There is a long, gradual period before extreme changes begin, and the aggressiveness these ads emphasize can often be mitigated with simple mood medications that are harmless and affordable.
Meanwhile, there is a real-life story to be told here of real-life experience. I hope you will read and share it. Dementia is a reality for many of us and, unfortunately, promises to be a reality for many more. Truth is our best armor against being cast into despair by the prospect. I hope to add a little to that sustaining truth. Dementia is one of the many ways all of us will evolve from this life into whatever may lay beyond. Passing on is our universal destiny. Some of those passages involve discomfort and unpleasantness. We can perhaps be a bit better prepared if we understand realistically what to expect. That is what our story – Jonathan’s and mine – is meant to do. Help others – in an honest and caring fashion – to be prepared.
On a more personal note, I hope you are all right. I have been worried about you. I continue to pray that you are navigating your own difficult passage as well as can be expected. Love and Blessings. Alice
This post sings to me. Thank you, Alice. Much joy and peace to you in the new year.
Much joy and peace to you also dearest Kayelle. I feel blessed to know you. Happy New Year. Alice
Beautiful blog post. Wishing you a season, and a year, filled with love!
Wishing you the same Jennifer. And thank you for your encouraging words. Alice
Lovely like you
You are lovely also dear Joan. Happy New Year. Alice
Thank you for opening yourself up. This is certainly true for me. Happy New Year!
Thank you Charlotte. Yes, there was some opening up involved with this post, and I almost deleted it at the last minute. I was raised with the admonition never to “wash my dirty linen in public.” This post would have been considered a rude and indiscreet violation of that dictate. But, nonetheless, it is the truth, and not just for me. So I spoke the words, and I feel refreshed to have done so. Thank you for supporting me in that. It means a lot. Alice
Dear Charlotte. You have commented on my blog posts in the past. I invite you to explore my most recent series. It is titled “Oh No I’m a Caregiver – Dementia – Our Cautionary Story.” These posts are of special significance to me. Dementia appears to be a reality destined to assault all of our lives in one way or another eventually. I believe that the story I have to tell – through my initial post and others yet to come at https://www.aliceorrbooks.com – has valuable insights to offer. For this reason, I hope you will read it and pass it on to others so that they might benefit from what I am learning and from those insights.
For example… My husband Jonathan, who has recently been diagnosed with dementia, is actually quite fine at this early stage. He is engaged in lots of cognitively powerful activities. He writes original memoir pieces that are very good and says this is the result of sitting in on so many of my writing workshops over the past forty-five years. He now finds more joy in writing than the drawing and music that were his usual creative pursuits in the past. This is good because, as you know, portraying characters and composing scenes require a deep level of focus and detail concentration which is very beneficial for him. He also loves jigsaw puzzling – the 1500-piece variety. Again much concentration is required plus he has fond memory associations of doing puzzles with his mom when he was a boy. He also reads a lot – challenging books, as well as his favorite New York Times articles. He does regular physical exercise and has also begun gardening at our church which has a large planted space in sore need of attention. Medically, he is taking a basic drug that has disappeared his brain fog for the timebeing. We also have excellent medical professionals on our team and on our side.
Dementia is not like the tv commercials portray it to be. Their purpose is to ramp up fear and sell very expensive, very dangerous drugs. There is a long, gradual period before extreme changes begin, and the aggressiveness these ads emphasize can often be mitigated with simple mood medications that are harmless and affordable.
Meanwhile, there is a real-life story to be told here of real-life experience. I hope you will read and share it. Dementia is a reality for many of us and, unfortunately, promises to be a reality for many more. Truth is our best armor against being cast into despair by the prospect. I hope to add a little to that sustaining truth. Dementia is one of the many ways all of us will evolve from this life into whatever may lay beyond. Passing on is our universal destiny. Some of those passages involve discomfort and unpleasantness. We can perhaps be a bit better prepared if we understand realistically what to expect.
That is what our story – Jonathan’s and mine – is meant to do. Help others – in an honest and caring fashion – to be prepared. Love and Blessings. Alice