Boxing Day

Our European cousins, as well as others around the world, have a few priorities straight. One of them is Boxing Day, the day after Christmas. In this country, we scurry back to work. But, elsewhere, Boxing Day is a national holiday that offers an extra day to come down from the frenzy of the season. It is programmed with sporting events such as rugby, soccer, and cricket (in the Southern Hemisphere). And shopping. The equivalent of our Black Friday.

            This is not to ignore that many people are on vacation this week. Schools are closed. But it is satisfyingly different to have a bank holiday, lessening the horse trading that must go on about who will cover the office, and pressing us together for one more day. At least until all the boxes are broken down and readied for recycling, the dishes put away, the pie gone, along with the leftover turkey or roast. 

            You are entitled to your own set of facts when it comes to the origins of Boxing Day because there are none. I will save you a trip to Wikipedia, which seems to come down on the side of those who say the name derives from a tradition of presenting a box to employees and contractors with a tip for services rendered over the year. Alternatively, food: household staff would have the day off after working the holiday and be sent to the relatives laden with the remains of their employer’s feast, in boxes, from the day before. 

            No children or grandchildren at home with us for Christmas this year. We had our fair share at Thanksgiving, and they went off to the in-laws this time. We slid in around my brother’s table, next to nieces and nephews who are accomplishing wonderful things in the world as public school teachers, policy advocates, and financiers.

I am learning to let go of the idea I know more than these young people, despite having accumulated a lot of knowledge over the years. They argue points one after the other, rat-a-tat-tat, while I wander the dusty shelves of my mind in search of references I can bring to the discussion. Here is one, I will think, except that in the moment it takes to retrieve the item from where it is buried among the stacks in my memory, the conversation has moved on and dessert is on the table. This may be one reason why older people embrace dessert the way they do. We have come to terms with no longer being part of the problem-solving set. On the other hand, there is pudding.

Next year is a Presidential election year. My New Year’s resolution is going to be seeing as many of the candidates as I can when they come through the state, always a unique opportunity for us in New Hampshire. It will be a year for escaping the filters by trying to hear from them firsthand. 

The national broadcast filters are particularly stingy with what they report. I encourage anyone who asks (and plenty who don’t), to stay away from places like MSNBC and FOX unless they are content to remain in one lane and let it take them wherever it goes—which is nowhere new, since the only pursuit of those outlets is preserving the size of the viewing audience. Partisanship turns out to be the easiest and cheapest strategy for that, but it is not especially good for us.

If you are lucky enough to live in a town with a local newspaper like this one, you can rely on balanced reporting. Economics is a driver here, too. Small communities struggle to support their local papers which must, of necessity, respond to the needs of the whole. It leads them to be deeply invested in reflecting the lives and sensibilities of the entire neighborhood. The result, the experts say, is social cohesion. Judge for yourself. I think it works.

Between now and the New Year there is more time for revelry. I expect we will be in bed before the ball drops, but a fast compilation of things to remember 2023 by will include the March snowstorm, a trip to the Middle East, fear for the Middle East, rain, bridge work (is forever), puppies are more work than babies, and that, all in all, we can’t think of someplace we would rather be. 

It goes in the box with the rest of the season’s precious gifts.

(Published December 26, 2023 in the Monadnock Ledger-Transcript)