A personal remembering
by Melinda Pillsbury-Foster
On Thanksgiving Day
of 2001 my kids asked me a question as we sat around the table after
dinner. It had been a perfect holiday filled with happy memories
revisited and cooperative efforts over turkey and stuffing.
This was one of those
questions you never anticipate having asked but it lead to many
insights and to this book.
Later I sat down to
write an explanation about where the family custom Ayn asked about
had originated. Looking for the origin of the Star became a quest
into the dusty reaches of my own mind and heart, through paper trails
and the lives of people long forgotten. I found the Star and confronted
many more unasked questions; I found many answers I didn’t know
needed answering.
But this is still the
explanation I sat down to write for my children. It is still the
story of the Star for Christmas.
The Beginning
Dearest Children,
Each of you grew up
with the Christmas Star carrying your dreams, wishes and thoughts
to the top of the tree on Christmas Eve. That has always been my
favorite moment of the Christmas Season.
I can shut my eyes and
see the succession of trees, one after another. Tinsel and evergreen
scents always make me smile. They always take me to that moment.
Hearing you each read your wish and intention from the previous
year was all delight; listening to my own was nearly always painful
and frustrating. My wishes never came true. I felt as if I was treading
water; and not very successfully, I might add.
You wanted the real
story and you are going to get it. I loved the Star, loved listening
to each of you grow up in thought and acted intention even as I
grew more and more bewildered over my inability to accomplish what
I thought were my own goals.
It hadn’t always been
like that.
Christmas is the celebration
of the birth of Jesus Christ. But we all know it does not mark the
date of His birth but the approximate time of Winter Solstice, the
ancient human celebration of the year turning itself back from death
toward life. The Solstice marks the moment in time when the process
of death reverses itself. The descent into dark and cold pause and
the world is born again. It is an entirely appropriate day to mark
the birth of a Savior. Winter is still present but the template
for the coming seasons are now locked in promise of renewal. To
our distant ancestors it must have been magic. As with all life
and faith it holds mysteries unsummed and untasted.
Did I understand this
truth when I started the custom of the Star for Christmas? I think
unconsciously I did.
You asked a question
and I am going to answer it. How did the custom start?
Answers are amazing
things.
When someone is 45
years in the grave we stop thinking about him as he was, especially
when that person lives in the minds of others as a legend. But Jimmy
had not become the legendary James Dean when I knew him.
He was just a skinny
young man who hunched his shoulders and peered at the world through
thick glasses.
You have probably seen
his three movies. Most people hold an image in their minds of Jimmy
that is more movie than reality. That is not unreasonable. He did
not live long enough to express who he was through a lifetime of
acts. But the Jimmy I knew was not like the image.
Images and reality only
rarely match.
It has taken me two
years from Ayn’s asking to this book. I discovered, on retrospection,
that my reasons were as complex as my knitting bag when you kids
finished rerolling my yarn.
The colors followed
twisted and unconsidered paths linking the events and emotions from
many lives that had touched my own.
The answer was the peace
found in silence, the images preserved in photographs and James
Dean. You tell me which was most unlikely.
When you finish reading
this, you will understand.
Your question forced
me to think about the whys of Melinda; tracing thoughts into a past
I didn’t like remembering to find the answer you wanted. I went
looking for the Star and found myself.
