The Feast of The Three Wise Men
Tags: Life Lessons, Christmas, Epiphany, Website, Tradition

Childhood traditions that I still keep alive today

Photo by Paola Chaaya on Unsplash

Welcome, come sit with me in my living room.

Most likely, you’re aware that The Three Wise Men, whose travel coincides with the birth of Baby Jesus, didn’t arrive at that manger until the twelfth night. Well to be exact, that day is today, January 06th.

In some countries today is the day that children receive presents from the Three Wise Men and, according to my parents, the day the Wise Men come to ‘take back’ presents from ungrateful children. You gotta love that one!

Anyway, in keeping with the Catholic Church’s official schedule, today marks the end of the Christmas Season. Feast of the Epiphany, the Church calls it.

My parents borrowed from that tradition and kept ‘everything Christmas’ until the weekend leading to this day. With my father at the helm, we took down all decorations and gently as ever put Christmas back into boxes, transporting everything back to Grandma’s attic.

After Father passed, the shop display window was no more and Mother kept the house adorned until the week school started. That week, we’d come home from school to less red and green until at last, we’d morph into new activities, pleased, most of all, that the wise men didn’t stop by our house to take back the gifts we’d received from Santa.

For all of my adult life I have believed in the Christmas story and the three wise men. It’s what I know. Even today, I keep my house in Christmas colors that will disappear tomorrow.

Years ago an old roommate of mine with Russian roots refrained from opening the Christmas presents I’d give her on Christmas Day. “I’ll open on New Year’s Day,” she’d say, smiling, “that’s when Ded Moroz, our Russian Santa, comes to children in Russia.”

And so we had presents to open on New Year’s Day.

She also requested that our small decorated tree stay up until January 7th. Coming from a place where I knew about the Three Wise Men arriving on January 6th, I had no problem with her request except that it sounded strange to me that she called our tree a New Year’s tree. No biggie. I embraced her traditions without question happy that our little tree helped to preserve our different upbringing.

Do you have any such customs, or traditions? Would you share them with me?

I hope your Christmas Season was splendid and that the New Year brings you closer to fulfilling the desires you hold dearest in your heart. May joy abide in your home, may the Christmas spirit, that I’m sure put a skip in your step at years end, stays with you until December comes again. And I Wish You Miracles, dear friends.

As for me and the desires I hold dear in my heart, God permitting, I see this year as the year I rise a tier closer to where I want to be.

Two years ago I started my writing journey in earnest. Since then I’ve made tons of unbelievable connections, I’ve had tons of failed trials and likewise, tons of beautiful aha moments. It’s still amazing to me how unbelievable these last two years have been. I’ve had to let go of some things that were dragging me down, keeping me spinning my wheels and not getting me anywhere. But all in all, by letting go I’ve made room to allow new things in. Positive things.

I’m still working on my website and I believe this is a good time to tell you that recently I’ve been working hard on understanding the purpose of my author website.

It’s not Publicity or even a Promotional tool, but a Platform where I record the Progress of the work I hope to accomplish slowly and bring to fruition in a couple of years. A Platform where I invite my subscribers to Partake in The Journey I’ve been contemplating practically all my life.

My website will undergo a slight change in direction, starting with the name. But you, dear prospective subscriber, will not need to move a finger to accommodate the change. Wait, I need to rephrase that: perhaps a ‘click here’ is all it’ll take. I really hope you don’t feel that’s too much to ask of you.

The blog posts I publish every two weeks or so will continue but interspersed, sort of what this post looks like today, I’ll fill you in on what’s happening with the novel I’ve been rewriting.

As of last month, I think you’ll be pleased to know that I finally decided on the title: ‘Days Without Grace.’ And the themes explored in the novel are gentleness and naivety, openness and gender roles, sexual preferences and lies, and corruption: human trafficking.

I hope this has piqued your curiosity enough to send you over to check out my website which I mention in my profile.

I Wish you a Happy end of the holiday ‘Season,’ a fantabulous New Year and most of all I Wish You Miracles. Thank you for reading. Selma.