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kimberlysteeleA Charlie Brown Christmas almost did not make it past the cutting room floor. For those who have not seen the special or who have not seen it in a great while, the story arc was the problem. After the special was commissioned by the CBS television network, its creator Charles Schultz proceeded to spin a tale of Charlie Brown’s search for the true meaning of Christmas that used the quotation of a New Testament verse about the birth of Christ as its centerpiece.
In the special, Charlie Brown is tasked by his bossy friend, Lucy, to direct the local Christmas pageant. Lucy the self-appointed Christmas Queen directs Charlie Brown to obtain a tree for the play, instructing that it should be a shiny, new, pink aluminum number of the sort of artificial trees that were popular in the 1960s. Charlie Brown, bewildered by the forest of fake trees at the store, chooses a pathetic, small, cheap, yet entirely real tree and brings it to his pals.
Lucy and his friends lambast him for his failure, calling him stupid. Charlie Brown becomes sad and depressed, feeling he has let everyone down. He wonders aloud if anyone knows what Christmas is all about at the Christmas pageant. His friend Linus walks into the spotlight and answers him with a quote from the Bible:
“And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people.
For unto you is born this day in the city of David a savior, which is Christ the Lord. Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.”
-Luke 2:11-14
Inspired by the revelation of the real reason for the season, Charlie Brown takes his tree home and decides to decorate it himself. The tree becomes so heavy with ornaments and lights that it collapses. Charlie Brown gives up and walks off, dejected and discouraged. Meanwhile, his friends, who followed him and watched him without his knowledge, take up decorating the little tree where Charlie Brown left off. Linus supports it from the bottom with his most cherished possession, his blanket, and the others add similarly valuable contributions. The tree is transformed by their attention and stands upright again, beautiful, and proud. Charlie Brown returns to the scene. His friends shout “Merry Christmas, Charlie Brown!” and sing carols as snow begins to fall.
By the time the sponsors were lined up, Schultz revealed that A Charlie Brown Christmas would buck several trends. It omitted the laugh tracks common to comedy specials of that era. Its message was decidedly anti-commercial. Its soundtrack did not shout earworm jingles over a three chord hook matrix (I’m looking at you, Frosty and Rudolf) that dripped in sugar without spice. There was also that pesky Christian message about the birth of Jesus. It was the 1960s during a time when TV especially was pushing an atheist, increasingly materialist agenda. CBS nearly punted A Charlie Brown Christmas to the curb. Little did anyone realize it would instantly become one of the most popular Christmas specials of all time, its message of simplicity and cooperation appealing to generation after generation of watchers around the world.
A Charlie Brown Christmas is about rejecting competitive perfectionism for a more wholesome, grounded, humble, and practical approach that includes all, including the spirit of a cut-down pine tree. It also denies the forces of greed and consumerism without going into any kind of direct, head-to-head battle with those forces. The same can be said of my book, Sacred Homemaking. Our current culture of beautiful people with performatively perfect lives is designed to make all who look upon them perceive themselves as lesser, worse, and shoddy. Comparison is the thief of joy. Ironically, Christianity itself has fallen victim to the Wendigo of having to be a perfect religion, driven by the impulse to amass, absorb, and consume in order to dominate the perceptible and imperceptible Earth. Christianity is not the only force doing this, of course — nearly every other world religion, including atheism, insists its way is the only way forward. I wish this sort of Highlander, there-can-be-only-one! approach was confined to religion.
Meanwhile, back in the microcosm, we have toxic influencers who climb the piles created by the Machine in order to stake out a living in a world where it has become nearly impossible to make a living by fair and honest means. I roast one of these types in the first chapter of Sacred Homemaking while I discuss the astral-etheric value of a stale piece of coffee cake compared to an organic lemon/kale/parsley smoothie:
“Sometimes, a slice of stale coffee cake can be healthier than a freshly made green smoothie. Let’s say a health nut on an extremely restrictive diet purees a bunch of organic parsley and kale with water and lemon juice and drinks a generously sized tumbler of this bizarre concoction. The giant parsley–kale shake is part of a grueling routine and part of an equally grueling faith that eating right and exercising like a maniac is the key to physical beauty and true wellness. As she chugs the disgusting blend, she convinces herself that she can look like the toxic influencer who claims drinking the mixture will guarantee results similar to her heavily edited photos. Contrast a more balanced individual who enjoys a modest portion of stale coffee cake while giving sincere thanks to all who brought the cake into being, as well as the opportunity to eat it in peace. The coffee cake will be transformed by the person eating it. Though both the smoothie and the slice of coffee cake have similar calorie counts, I believe the woman drinking the smoothie will have to work much harder to keep the calories from making her fat and sick. Though it cannot be scientifically proven because gratitude is not a quantifiable, measurable substance, gratitude makes the coffee cake far more nourishing on the level of the energy plane, and the energy plane is where food matters. Just as Charlie Brown’s Christmas tree ends up being more beautiful than larger, more modern artificial trees, the simple meal of poor ingredients becomes more nourishing than the extravagant on via the power of gratitude.”
-Excerpt from Sacred Homemaking: A Magical Approach to a Tidier Home
Consider how the Charlie Brown metaphor can be applied to things you own or spaces you occupy: that is sacred homemaking in a nutshell, appreciating the humble and working with what you’ve got instead of what everyone else tells you is a must-have. Consider how the metaphor can be applied to the people in your life — the ones who are not quite right, deficient, and perhaps annoying. The Charlie Brown Christmas special is quietly revolutionary when you apply its message to your own life. Charlie Brown stumbles onto the Christmas tree that becomes far more than the sum of its parts via faith, focusing on the positive, and gratitude. When you ignore the messages to embrace fakery, glamour, and glitz in your own life that insist you could be much “improved”, what happens? When you look past the frantic programming that tries to convince you that good is synonymous with flashy appearances, what happens?
Okay, now I am seriously back to my previously scheduled essay break! I will be writing my customary two essays a week, one public and one private, right after the New Year. I am also going to make a private area on my kimberlysteele.dreamwidth.org for people who have been disenfranchised by Substack and their own local petty dictators for refusing to do age verification scans. Thank you all for your wonderful support, including those who simply read this blog and do nothing more. I appreciate you. Merry belated Christmas.
