Jarring Christmas Observation

Recreating a half-written observation from December

Originally posted January 14, 2025

As I walk toward the bus stop in the dark early morning hours, Billie Holiday’s Strange Fruit in my earbuds, I come across the life-sized Christmas creche displayed on the square. I’ve seen it many times, not just this year, but also last year, my first in the city. It had almost become “background noise” in my life.

When I came upon it, then, with that song in my ears, it was somewhat shocking. It appeared to me, so large and obvious, so obnoxious a sign of the hypocrisy it portrayed.

The dark-skinned “wise man,” bearing his gift (Was his the frankincense, gold, or myrrh?) seemed to loom even more large to me, the sounds of Billie’s haunting voice in my ears, a song that alone can bring tears to my eyes. Overlapping her words, I can barely hear but not make out the strains of a traditional Christmas song from the public speakers around the nativity scene. The combination of them creates a jarring feeling within me.

The layering of the dark faces (at least that much is correct) in the mythological scene in front of me with the sounds and words of the hurt and painful descriptions in the song of the “strange fruit” in the trees creates a mental collage that stands in stark contrast with the knowledge of those who most revere the portrayal of this particular birth (somehow so “different” from so many others that are in fact the very same) as holy, while also being responsible for the horrors being recounted in my ears. The idea that in some kind of upside-down logic, the ongoing destruction (still now!) of people who are immortalized as “wise” in this particular context disgusts and unnerves me. I don’t understand and never have been able to.

I have learned that to try and make sense out of nonsensical humans does nothing so much as make ME crazy, so most of the time I have stopped trying. But every once in a while, as in this moment, an overt demonstration of it stops me in my tracks and makes me take notice. Not knowing what else I can do, I notice. I note. I can share my observation at least.

What, if anything, that may do to impact the world and the people around me, I don’t know. But I do believe in the aphorism of the flapping of a butterfly’s wings that has the potential to make waves around the world. That, and the fact that I’m writing this down, bring me some small hope.