It is yet another finals week, and we have just discovered some intrepid wee mice scampering in and out of our bedrooms. They're obviously babies, because they haven't learned stealth, but go hopping around in broad daylight (they're also little and fuzzy, and quite adorable). This makes for some amusing scenes (Victoria and I were highly entertained by one that was trying to hide from us behind a clear glass bottle), but it also means that we have a nest, an infiltration. We've set traps, but the bait has been mysteriously disappearing, likely indicating that Mom and Dad Mouse are sending the tiny ones to scoop up the bait and bring it back to the nest, because they're dumb enough to comply and too light to activate the traps. So, I think we're resorting to mousing. What fun.
How's that for an anecdote? More thoughts from the term will surface over break, I'm sure, but what is immediate in my mind is that today is St. Nicholas' Day. This is an important day in the Advent cycle (which began three weeks ago), where we celebrate one of the great saints who conveyed the love of Christ to those around him. The story is that he knew a poor family who had daughters, and took it upon himself to provide the girls with money for dowries (thus saving them from their father's intention of prostituting them for extra funds). It became a tradition to give gifts on December 5th or 6th in remembrance of St. Nicholas, a tradition that is still very common in Northern Europe, where children leave a shoe out over night, to find it filled with goodies in the morning. Gift-giving at Christmas has a long heritage. So...St. Nicholas, Santa Claus, Father Christmas...remember where this tradition derives from, who he really is and what he did, and that he did it for Christ. I know I'm inspired even more to give gifts out of love and in celebration of Christ's Nativity.
With that, cheers to you for Christmastime!
