[redwitch]

Two Christmases really stand out for me. The first one was truly magical. We were in Munich, Germany. My mother being German followed the old traditions faithfully. That meant no tree until Christmas Eve. We went to Midnight Mass and still no tree. Of course, being 4, I was very fretful and truly feared the Krist Kind could not find our house or leave his gift under the tree if there was no tree. We got home from church and the tree was in the living room -- it was the biggest tree I'd ever seen. Under it were the gifts from the Krist Kind thanking us for our year of devotion. To this day, I still don't know where my parents hid the tree until Christmas Eve, let alone got it decorated and out.

The other was in St. Petersburg, Russia (Stalingrad) back them. This was in the mid-50s and, of course, religion was pretty much banned in the Soviet Union, even the embassies had to keep religious celebrations pretty quiet, which meant no decorated trees or buildings. I was so sad that we couldn't celebrate Christmas properly and, of course, wondered how St. Nicholas and the Krist Kind could possibly come to this country where they were so hated. Of course, both came as planned but it was still a sad kind of Christmas Eve. I went to bed expecting Christmas Day to be pretty anti-climatic. Instead, I woke up to a true winter wonderland. It had snowed during the night and St. Petersburg was all glistening white with its beautiful gold domed buildings. We, as a family, exchanged our gifts, had our Christmas breakfast and then played in the snow all day. It has become one of my favorite memories both because of the sadness of a nation that could not celebrate and the beauty that came.