voice to guide things accordingly. When I proposed the reflection and discussion guide idea to my publisher, I did so while telling him that I was completely sure that I knew the perfect person to write it! My dear friend Anne Brandner is highly gifted, insightful, thoughtful and humble. So much so that the very tenor of Anne’s bright and warm personality was what I was (and am) certain would be ideal. And now, the book in your hand includes this special component complementing each chapter, ideal for personal reflection or for group discussion.
The Christian adaptation of Yule or Yuletide, repurposing it as Christmastide, is a far cry from its ancient origin. Yuletide was a complex pagan festival fraught with drunkenness, bloody sacrifice and idols. But we humans are great over the long haul at shape-shifting, sometimes for better, sometimes for worse. While the Norse god Odin would be hard-pressed to agree, I would suggest on the Yuletide front it is definitely for the better. Spinning the wheels of time forward, the term “Yuletide” is contextualized in the chapters before you with all the warmth and sentiment most of us have come to receive it with in modern times.
With that said, all in all, The Yuletide Factor will no doubt resonate with the softening of hearts that comes with the warm glow of December. Still, this author’s own heart’s desire is that it might spark that same urge to share blessing and goodness no less during the dreary February blahs, the sweltering dog days of summer, or any swirling snow globe season you find yourself in.
No writer writes unbent by his or her own ever-changing theology or philosophies. Even, or perhaps “especially,” those who claim they do. As it was in the first two books of what I envisioned to be a three-part series (Bent Hope, Dancing with Dynamite and now The Yuletide Factor), what follows leans in to my own ever-evolving take on humanity, hope, celebration, grace, and God—authentically and humbly shared, for your consideration.
Ultimately though, there is one foundational reality this book builds on that I consider to be far more objective than subjective, something I would consider a widely accepted truth. That is that—regardless of the presence or lack of depth or persuasion of one’s own spiritual faith—many, if not most, North Americans enter into and dwell in the Christmas season more thoughtfully, generously and graciously than they do the rest of the calendar year. Thus, while this book unapologetically exposes the beauty of the Christmas season, it also explores the sad state of affairs in simply choosing goodness as a synergetic seasonal experience, and it challenges one and all to factor in Yuletide at every opportunity.
While the plotlines touch down on everything from street outreach to Santa Claus, adored traditions to laughable misadventure, winter follies and multi-season escapades, they all return to the true Christmas story in one way or another. Not simply a stagnant snow globe scene capturing but a moment; rather, an astounding and supernatural story meant to impact lives every second of the day, every day of the year. A story meant to free all people from living in fear and hiding. A story meant to set all people down a pathway guided by the signposts of comfort and joy. A story that ultimately exposes life’s broken snow globes and facedown villagers in the light of understanding, deep compassion and extraordinary hope. Transcendent far beyond the warmth of the Christmas spirit, the story of infinite and eternal blessing. Where there are no cover-ups to tend to or messes to hide.
All of it validating my heartfelt welcome to readers and, regardless of the date on the calendar when these pages find you, wishing one and all, with deep sincerity,
Merry Christmas.
Chapter 1: Bedrock and Bethlehem
It’s an interesting exercise to reflect on the influential personalities and icons of one’s youth, and bizarre, if not a bit sad, to realize that there might have been as many, or more, fictional characters as real ones. Truth be told, for many of us a number of those same fictional characters still weigh in considerably through adulthood. Such is the case for me.
Perhaps I would feel some better about it if those written-into-being characters near and dear to my own heart and mind were notably revered by scholars and well-read thinkers, fictional dignitaries the likes of Sir Lancelot and Hamlet or folksy VIPs such as Anne of Green Gables and Tom Sawyer.
But in reality, it is more than just a turn of phrase to say mine are very Mickey Mouse. In my case, the personalities and characters I held dear, and hold dear, are a merry mishmash of cartoon characters. A strange truth that no doubt helped, at least in part, land me in one of the world’s most renowned classic animation college courses upon graduation from high school.
To this day, the image of Fred Flintstone gives me a jolt of happy, warm familiarity, taking me back to the glee I knew rushing home from elementary school at the first ding of the lunch bell to spend half an hour in Bedrock and then sadly rushing back just moments after Fred’d shout “Wilmaaaaaaaaa” in the closing credits.
In fact, later in life, the very first time I felt any kind of crisis about my age, or aging in general, was in context to Fred Flintstone. Years ago, I was at home tending to my baby daughter Sarah Jane and stumbled across an episode of the Flintstones on TV. I happily left it on in the background as I played with my daughter on the floor. She was just starting to walk, wobbling and balancing her way from one piece of furniture to the next. At one point she ventured from the couch all the way to the TV stand and stood in front of it proudly, while on the screen behind her Fred’s daughter, Pebbles, crawled by, not yet at the walking stage. I gasped with extraordinary self-awareness. For the very first time in my life, just prior to my thirtieth birthday, I was completely taken aback that I must now actually be the same age as, or older than, Fred Flintstone! And not only was I now old enough to be fully understanding the adult plot lines about complex matters such as identity crisis, ageism, and relationship tribulation—but I was supposed to be relating to them.
It’s likely we all have Fred Flintstones in our lives. Time-stands-still characters that somehow find their way into psyches and stay there, no matter how silly they are. Or, perhaps more apropos, no matter how silly we are.
I might guess that one of the reasons cartoon characters sustain our interests and affection, generation after generation, is that while we age and move through all the crises, changes and challenges that come with growing up and aging, they never do. You can count on them not to. And there is some kind of inexplicable comfort in their impractical sameness and how it makes us feel.
And if that nutty sensibility is so for any of us, over any number of would-be fictional friends and heroes, it helps shed a great contextual light on the superstar status of the unstoppable, unaging beyond aged, one and only Santa Claus.
In fact, Fred Flintstone and Santa Claus do have something very poignant in common. For both, at the grassroots of their fiction is great reality.
The co-creator of the 1960s era The Flintstones, William Hanna, candidly admitted that Fred and company were an animated copycat of the 1950s classic television show The Honeymooners, which was borne out of a stark reality-check look at the challenging working class lifestyle and hardships faced by many young married couples living in Brooklyn, New York, apartment complexes at the time.
A grander jaunt, by far, the long and convoluted evolution of the Western world’s make-believe 20th and 21st centuries’ Santa Claus springs from loosely chronicled truths about an unconventional Christian saint thriving in (modern-day) southwest Turkey in the 4th century, living out a penchant for bringing cheer by way of great generosity to children out of his substantial wealth. Known as the saintly “protector of children and sailors,” by the time the 14th century Renaissance began unfolding, Nicholas’s popularity and lore had spread all across Europe. Ultimately, it was 18th century Dutch settlers that brought Sinter Klaas—an abbreviation of Sint Nikolaas (Dutch for Saint Nicholas)—across the ocean, tweaking a New York newspaper reporter’s interest in the settlers’ December celebrations commemorating the anniversary of the
