speak softly….

I know it’s been coming, this Christmas thing. I’ve seen the lights, the trees, the online ads. I’ve received lists from loved one and given them too. I’ve even bought a few teacher gifts in preparation. But I haven’t felt the spirit of the holiday, not until this morning when I read my friend Whitterer’s post on things Christmas. What tipped the balance was not the picture of her daughter’s handmade ornament, or her mention of carols. No, it was the reminder she threw into my “haven’t paid attention to Christmas” machine, like a proverbial wrench in a cog.

Which came in the form of her favorite Christmas movie, “The Snowman.”

I first discovered this story when Josie was little. We had the original book, a tiny, chubby, cardboard-paged thing that I picked up out of curiosity. The story itself is simple: one morning, a boy builds a snowman. In the middle of the night, the snowman comes to life, he and the boy have a marvelous adventure (cooking a snack in the kitchen, exposing the snowman to the powers of the TV set, trying on the boy’s father’s clothes, taking flight to the snowman’s winter home). In the morning, when the boy wakes up to see the snowman again, yes, you guessed it, the snowman has melted.

As a little girl, Josie loved the book, but by the time I found the movie (a loving and brilliant adaptation of the book, and only thirty minutes long at that!) and showed it to her, she was old enough to offer up, “That’s depressing,” at the point where the boy stares at the puddle of melted snowman. You have to see this movie to understand how true her words to be. But even so, I loved that movie then and I love it still and later tonight, when the weather turns chilly, I will put it on for Evan and remember the loving adventure, the music, the prankster snowman and the beautiful depiction of friendship.

Happy holidays.