In the absence of flowers and leaves, let there be lights! Strung around trees and shrubs, wound around railings and arbors, adding sparkle to this special season.
Lights are the most vibrant part of holiday apparel, filling the dark, empty void and making everything a lot less gloomy. Variations on the theme are as diverse as the gardens out there, ranging from a plain spotlight shining on a tree to the soft candle glow in a window to colorful extravagant shows that blink and pulsate into the night.
As a kid, I was drawn to the latter style of holiday decorating – large and plastic and alive: Santa in his sleigh with his team of reindeer, Nativity scenes, snowmen, gingerbread people. … Let’s face it, these were the ones that you could see out of the steamy, rear car window! My parents’ sedate setup of a spotlighted wreath and colored bulbs on the shrubs paled in comparison. Of course, my tastes migrated in that department as they did in other things, softening to the point where I have a tendency to keep things simple.
Maybe not as simple as my husband. Years back when I deigned to let him string the lights on the Christmas tree, I couldn’t help noticing that he began at the bottom, draping it with a certain caprice, and ignored the section that ran along the wall. “Er, aren’t you going to clip the light to the branches?” I asked. “And you can’t just leave the back naked!” Needless to say, I took over and did it my way. He didn’t seem to mind, relieved to go back to his football game. Since then, I am the stringer of the lights, something I rather enjoy.
My children, over the years, have been wowed by Christmas lights – dating back to when I put up colored lights on a hemlock tree in the backyard each Christmas season. Until alas I recalled how the ladder sank into the mud one March as I de-strung them. Thenceforth lighting was scaled back of indoor candles, tree lights and a splash of lighting on the shrubbery out front that remains in place all year.
Once when they were probably too young to appreciate such things, I brought my children to the shrine of Our Lady of La Salette in Attleboro. Volunteers work through the year to put the impressive Christmas Festival – which today is even more impressive – 400,000 to more than 1 million lights including over 100 new displays for the 2025 season, over 10 acres. That display is open until January 4, from 5:00 pm to 9:00 pm. The core experience of seeing the lights and the Nativity Museum costs nothing, making it a popular, accessible holiday destination.
Even as we are carried along by the torrent of the present moment, in the midst of some perfunctory activity, memories surface unexpectedly, offering moments of joy… as I place the Santa Claus doll with the wonky arm (by now an antique) on the model sailboat as I do each Christmas, my mind goes back to our annual pilgrimage to the city of Boston (where the doll was first gifted to me.) I, perhaps 8 years old, joined my grandmother, great aunt and mother for our highly anticipated Christmas shopping spree in Boston.
We would head from my grandmother’s in Uxbridge following the back roads through towns that included Holliston, Natick, Sherborn, Wellesley – through town centers, past old historic churches and town commons so much the fabric of New England small towns. We followed Route 16 and then onto Route 9 to Huntington Ave. and Copley Square. I would vividly remember the stretch up Commonwealth Ave. up to Boston Common where we would park before embarking on the stores that included Filene’s and Jordan Marsh. The three women were armed with their handwritten lists, and I was barely counter height, but very observant, watching as the lady salesclerks would assist the polite hordes of shoppers. The displays within the stores dazzled, and the crowds of people in their winter coats cast an indelible impression on this small-town girl. (At the time I of course had no idea that I would one day live and work in this same city.)
I recall the drive through the small towns going in and the utter majesty of Commonwealth Avenue Mall with its elegant Back Bay brownstones set against the parklike backdrop. On the ride home, everything glistened prettily with lighting – streetlights, shop windows, residences, even the trail of taillights added to the beauty of the scene. By then I was tired of being dragged from store to store, but I carried the magic of having visited Santa’s Village and enjoyed a special lunch surrounded by my matriarchal womenfolk. Looking back, I see that it was a time of bonding, and our relationships only grew stronger. It was a special closeness – female, caring, and warm.
As Christmas draws near and the days fill with hurried shopping and festive preparations, let us remember to pause. In the midst of the noise and motion, make space for stillness, reflection, and quiet moments of introspection, for these are the gifts that carry the deepest meaning.
“And Mama in her ‘kerchief, and I in my cap, Had just settled down for a long winter’s nap” – from Clement Clarke Moore’s “’Twas the Night Before Christmas/A Visit from St. Nicholas”
The Seaside Gardener
By Laura McLean