Silent Night

Christmas Eve. The road was in a deeper slumber than usual at 4:30 in the morning. So was the parking lot, and the office. It will probably continue to remain deserted till well after 5am or even 6. I had a restless night, but the solitude of this hour energized me. I was savoring every minute of this “peace on earth” while the world slept away.

There is something addictive about aloneness, or being the only sobering one. As I grew older, I have found it safe and exciting at the same time: safe as in no harm since you are at a vacuum state with everything, danger included, coming to a halt; exciting as in feeling the only one alive and awake. I would not have traded solitude such as this for a world of wealth. And it comes once a year on Christmas Eve.

Yes, Christmas shall come in just a few more hours. All gifts have been acquired, most of which delivered. We seem to have developed a pattern of simplifying this commercial ritual as years go by, especially after the children were grown. We would like to claim the true meaning of Christmas as our excuse, but the truth is neither one of us finds crowd or fighting crowd a plausible choice. For him, shopping itself already is a violation of existence. Shopping in a chaotic mass of fellow shoppers may well be burning in hell with unquenchable fire. I can sympathize with this sentiment fully once when I was at a supermarket in Okinawa surrounded by a swarm of shoppers with no room to breathe or move. It was like drowning in a sea and dying a hopeless and violent death. I remember having an out-of-body experience watching myself frozen in shock, unable to feel any movement except for tears swirling in my eyes. To me, hell would be that.

In contrast, the picture of heaven is never crowded, and hopefully quiet, like 4:40 in the morning at my office, or a drive on a winter road with snow draping on the trees and miles and miles of nothing in view except silence. It could also be the last Christmas Eve in New Hampshire after the church service when we drove on the deserted Route 101A to hunt for a restaurant for our Christmas dinner. When we finally found one, the elated shouts of joy escaping from all of us might as well be the same ones as if the pearly gates had just opened up for us. There were but two or three dinners inside. The food was nothing special and yet to dates it was by far the best dinner EVER. Somehow, the memorable and happy moments in life always seem to associate with peace and quiet, me-against-the-whole-world aloneness.

And yet, except for the solitude on the roads at 4am on Christmas Eve, no special moments in life can be planned or repeated. They came almost always in a surprise package. While there is no more 101A and no snow in the southern Virginia, we had made up our mind to recapture the New England magic this year. We headed out after 6:30pm, awaiting a city to retire with the stores closed and shoppers gone. Were we mortified to see Virginia violating all our expectation with cars coming and going in every direction, shops still open such as Wal-Mart, WalGreen and ample restaurants for choosing. Then when we got inside, we were seated with a roomful of merry diners eating and drinking away. It was like a 5-year-old on the Christmas morning anticipating a toy train, opening up a gift that resembles a train and NOT getting a train. The void followed by disillusion comes in and leaves him heartbroken. Gone was the silent night, the joy to the world and all hope and dream.

Does our memory ever retain its authenticity or unavoidably become tainted by our mind? The answer is obvious. As much as I would like to vouch for New England’s excellencies, I know well that she was by no means devoid of faults. Like a photographer, our mind continues to touch up our past, 2007 Christmas Eve included, to make her forever matchless. Mirage or not, her memory is indeed wrapped in heaven-like solace, from the snow buried winter to a whispering heart yearning for soundlessness. For me, the best Christmas gift is portrayed fully in that ancient old song: the Holy Infant, the promise of the redeeming grace, the heavenly peace – glistening in a night oh so silent.