I’ve been thinking about a mythical, historical Christmas dinner lately. It’s the one that featured a cooked goose, hissing gravy, mashed potatoes, the gush of stuffing, two small children gorged in sage and onion to the eyebrows, and a pudding regarded as the greatest success achieved by the housewife since the beginning of her marriage. But it’s the Christmas toast proposed by the man of the house, I’ve remembered this week.
“I’ll give you Mr. Scrooge,” announced Bob Cratchit in Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol, “the founder of the feast.”
“Such an odious, stingy, hard, unfeeling man as Mr. Scrooge,” Mrs. Cratchit scowls. And then she relents at her husband’s insistence, “I’ll drink his health for your sake and the Day’s.”
It’s that moment in the Dickens story, published exactly 170 years ago this week, that hits us deepest of all. Despite the natural instincts of an employee so horribly abused by his money-grubbing boss as Bob Cratchit is by Ebenezer Scrooge, the underpaid clerk still finds it in his heart to honour the essence of Christmas and acknowledge his “squeezing, wrenching, grasping, scraping, clutching, covetous, old sinner” boss as “the founder” of his family’s Christmas feast. And over the coming days, as we watch the Alastair Sim version or listen to CBC broadcast teams read the novella as charity fund-raisers across the country, the messages of forgiving and of giving shine through. At least they do for me.
Indeed, it’s the giving part that has been on my mind these past few weeks. It wasn’t necessarily a Christmas response, but certainly Canadians and others felt moved to dig deep for financial aid and assistance following the destruction by Typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines last month.
In part, I think it had a lot to do with the fact that so many Canadians from the Philippines are landed immigrants or citizens around us today. We witnessed their anxiety for missing family members and pain of lost communities at close range. They moved us to give early and often to the relief campaign.
But I’ve also seen gifts on a far less grand scale, in recent days, to realize that the season of giving is upon us. I rarely give cash donations to charities such as the Salvation Army through the year, but these days, each time I hear the bells and see the Sally Anne volunteer and glass pot, I dig as deeply as I can for loose change to donate.
And I’m sure I wasn’t the only one moved by the efforts of young people during our recent Santa Claus Parade gathering non-perishable foods and cash for the local Loaves and Fishes Food Bank. I asked a few of the young volunteers why they were giving this way.
“It’s the right thing to do,” one said. “Food bank users could be any one of us.”
These past few weeks of a semester at the college where I teach can traditionally be the toughest on students and faculty. The stress of delivery and deadline generally drive us all to the edge and far from human kindness. That’s why it was a pleasant change to see some of our students exchanging cards and embraces as the semester ends and the holidays arrive.
And as the days for shopping and coming up with original gift ideas diminish, I find myself thinking of ways other than giving gifts wrapped in paper and bows to offer my friends and family. As much as I can, I prefer to give in kind and of my time, rather than just in currency and material things.
But for the best sense of gift-giving, it’s the redemption scenes of Dickens’ A Christmas Carol that I returned to this week. In fact, one of my colleagues – the way she bundled herself with her sweater and scarf her in her chilly office during the cold snap this week – reminded me of that final scene of the famous story. Bob Cratchit has arrived late to work following a Christmas Day of celebrating with his impoverished family. He’s jumped onto his work stool “driving away with his pen as if he were trying to overtake 9 o’clock.” And Scrooge descends on him, as if for the kill.
“I’m not going to stand this sort of thing any longer,” Scrooge thunders as he jabs poor Cratchit in the waistcoat. “And therefore… And therefore, I am about to raise your salary… A Merry Christmas, Bob, a merrier Christmas, my good fellow, than I have given you for many a year. I’ll raise your salary and endeavour to assist your struggling family…”
It’s the gift of gifts, Scrooge’s gift to Bob and Tiny Tim. And we all know, in turn, the gift that Tim gave us: A memorable closing line to the novella:
“God bless us every one!”