What's wrong with Essex?Reliant121 wrote:Of course
I've been raised into a very...Inactive household. My father has long since done his fair share of travelling, and my mother is petrified of driving up a street she doesn't know let alone go to another county (Don't even mention going abroad) So we don't go on holiday. They have never bothered with big celebrations, Birthday's have gone largely unnoticed for years in my household (baring their 40th birthdays). I don't think I've had a cake since I was...6? maybe 7? Christmas has always been either a do nothing day or a chore, do nothing day if we are at home and a chore if mother makes us go up to Essex.
Anyway, there's plenty of folks like that, and there's nothing wrong with it. Growing up, we always had the joke "Christmas... or as the Jews call it, 'a day off.'" There's been another long-standing joke of the Jewish Christmas tradition of ordering Chinese take-out and going to see a movie. I've come to appreciate the take my wife's family has on the holiday because it melds religious observance (which I can appreciate, even though I don't share the faith,) cultural traditions, and a more modern family celebration.
Indeed, I was just pointing out that there is still a significant distinction. Many people still consider the difference between the Thomas Nast Santa Claus and the theological figure of St. Nicholas.Captain Seafort wrote:Nonetheless, one developed from the other, rather than having purely pagan origins as with the trees and the date.Mikey wrote:In our home, at least, the two are quite distinct. My wife's church strongly celebrates the feast day of St. Nicholas - December 6 - with a special mass, a visit from "St. Nicholas" for the children after mass, and a tradition of the children finding small gifts in shoes left out the night before.
