The Ghost of Christmas Present
Carols, Cornucopia and Ebenezer Scrooge
Comforting fireplace sounds play in the background, I am at my desk, seated near a closed window, and every time, I glance up from my station — the multi-coloured fairy lights I draped on a wall beside me blink, benignly so. Christmas-time is a season I hold close to my heart for reasons aplenty… There is an undercurrent this time though. I write this draft with acquiescence in my heart. The energy feels still, and I am thinking of the time between now and the Christmas preceding this season — a chasm… Oh, 2021.
I have to cut here, maybe things will make better sense as the words come along…
Tonight, I wished to talk about one of my favourite stories of all time, A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens. Thanks to a hand-me-down from my cousins, a battered Great Illustrated Classics copy came into my possession as a child. The Great Illustrated Classics books are like a time capsule into the past for me — a thing of great delight — the drawings and stories formed a significant part of my childhood (just as Scrooge loved his Ali Baba). To this day, if I find a copy, particularly titles I once owned and read — I will rejoice.
Returning to… This book!
Mr. Ebenezer. The Spirits three (four, if we count the visitation of Jacob Marley, Scrooge’s dead business partner).
Considering the Twenties, 2021 in all its particularity, it brings to mind what it means to live in a world feeling disconnected and far removed from what once was… I get ahead of myself. Ebenezer Scrooge, the protagonist in the book is described by Mr. Dickens as a mean old man with a hardened heart, and walls around him. He comes off as disgruntled, Grinchy, and is put off by all things Christmas (“Bah! Humbug!”) — particularly what he deems the commercialisation of the holiday (he is not wrong, but Good God, I love me the tinsel and tingz).
As a child or tween, or whenever I read the book, that is, I didn’t see him as a hateful character. A complex fellow, perhaps. As I see it now, he had demons of his own to encounter, upheavals to bear and move through. He was formidable, and well-known for it too. His behaviour at the beginning of Charles’s tale was uncharitable, unforgiving, and yet — he had his reasons, some of which became evident during the Ghost of Christmas Past’s visit. Mr. Dickens, without a doubt, knew what he wished to do with his story, and the messaging was clear. Still, my loyalties lay with Ebenezer, before his transformation and after it too. It brought a tear to my eye when he found himself gratefully hugging his bedpost, at the end of the book, after the Phantom’s visit. His changed behaviour warmed the cockles of my very heart.
Part of this is because I see myself in Scrooge, in the Capricorn-like disposition to disavow the foolish — those easily swayed by their emotions, his nature to self-preserve and believing it better to be all alone than betrayed by disappointment & dismissal owing to people’s scruples. He hadn’t had it easy; he was a severe man — he needed an intervention, a Divine one, and he received not one but three. He was a man like any other — you or me, he was capable of reflection & reformation — he simply needed guidance, a restoration of his Faith. C o g n i s a n c e that he was not alone, he never was, and in understanding that, his desire to live the rest of his days courageously shone through. His sorrows were better shared, his joy — best when uncontained, spilling out of him, filling other cups. There was enough for everyone, how could he have believed otherwise?
Like Scrooge, I feel done reliving certain chapters… I feel transformed in the way that I am learning to not easily dismay. I put the Book back onto its shelf. All the euphuisms, and this one too (thanks, Kemi Marie), I’m entering a new phase of my life and it’s one of joy and resilience. The seasons see me through. For this time, I am moving from the Three of Swords phase of my life to that of the Cups (all three) — I am at the mercy of the Most High, and me. I am my candle, star and eclipse.
TL; DR — Equanimity can be a strange thing. How may you feel light in your heart when a beloved is no longer? How must you know to persevere when all is taken away? Truthfully, I feel nonplussed as any of you. We live, we learn is what I can say. That this time will not be forgotten. These tears: Testament of a time to come. Revelation. Respite. Renewal.
Happy Full Moon in Gemini…
I wish you felicity, fortitude and fortune.
Thank you for reading.
A note: Let it be known that much as it’d be sweet, that you feel welcome here, experiences and views expressed on Rosewater. are deeply, truly, madly personal. (Unless stated otherwise.) Should they strike a chord with your own musings and reflections, that’s lovely, and if not, that’s cool too. This collection contains no facts, solo personal musings and truths.
