“Should Old Acquaintance Be Forgot…”
Robbie Burns did have a knack of asking the right questions. Auld Lang Syne will be chanted and bellowed by millions over the next few days in various different global time zones - and most people will have no idea what it means.
Christmas and the New Year is a time when we mark the letting go of the old and the coming of the new, whether it be just the idea of the ‘year’, or the marking of the winter solstice when the days cease to grow shorter and oh-so-slowly start to lengthen out again. The birth of Jesus is commemorated in the dead of winter only because Christians grafted their religious calender directly onto the pagan fertility calenders that centered upon the cycles of the seasons. In Christian orthodoxy Jesus came to save the world, just as the midwinter solstice reminds us that winter won’t go on forever, and that there is some hope for us in the future. It was a good idea at the time, since it brought both belief systems into a kind of harmony. Actually, though, no one has any clear idea what day Jesus was born.
Which brings us back to Burns. Burns’ poem was grafted onto an ancient Scottish folk tune (The Burns Society has some hauntingly beautiful recordings done with ancient instruments, by the way) and in it he registers not just the movement of the seasons but the shifting nature of our own lives’ phases. He asks us to recall that some friends are not present, and some friends have been left behind such that they are hardly missed any more. This is simply what happens. Yet they were all loved, once. So “we’ll take a cup of kindness yet” he says. We’ll raise a glass, kindly, to those we once loved who are now no longer at the center of our lives, and we’ll do that with our present friends, knowing that all friendships change, and some fade. Remember, he says, with kindness those we were once close to: ex-spouses, former lovers, former colleagues, estranged relatives, the whole lot. Kind, for Burns, had the twin meaning of spiritually generous and as if they were kin. Think of them lovingly, he urges us, think of them as if they were brothers and sisters.
In our fast-moving world we may have many friends on facebook but no time for most of them, and we may lose sight of those we do actually know and care about in the general rush of living. Burns reminds us: Friendships may change, but the love that created them is always there. We just have to be awake to that.
Perhaps I’m just sensitive to this since, as I prepare mailing lists for my new book I’m aware of all those people I think of fondly to whom I rarely write anything, let alone a Christmas card. Yet I still think of them, and if they rang the doorbell I’d be delighted to see them.
Happy New Year (a shade early).
on December 30th, 2007 at 7:04 pm
Your comments on “Robbie Burns” and “the shifting nature of our own lives’ phases, “brought home the point that change is afoot.
How could I not have noticed ? Especially since this week, I bundled up a year’s worth of bank statements and took the annual inventory for my business, all the while keeping myself in the dark about what my actiity signified.
So I’m a little surprised that your reminder of the “the cup of kindness” brought tears to my eyes. “Kind as spiritually generous” and kind “as if they were kin,” reminders of the melancholy lurking beneath the last page on my 2007 calendar: “Those friends not present and those left behind.”
It’s the push-pull of life, I suippose, the push-pull of reparations and tributes, thanks and regrets , the protoplasm of memoir.
Happy New Year, Allan.
Regards,
MLou
on December 30th, 2007 at 7:40 pm
What a beautiful and poignant post! It’s a wondrous idea to take this last day of the year to remember with kindness everyone who has graced our paths and wish them well as we wish ourselves well. May we all shine with what is best in ourselves and make it a brilliant new year!
on December 30th, 2007 at 8:55 pm
Dear Cathy,
Yes, indeed. It’s time to take those momenst and value the past, let go of what needs to be released, and welcome the new. For if we make no space in our lives by letting go then nothing new can enter…. And we can’t really let go of anything unless we have first fully appreciated it.
As ever, Allan
on December 30th, 2007 at 8:59 pm
Dear Mary Lou,
The tears you describe as surprising you are to be treasured beyond pearls. Tears are a way of valuing - perhaps the most direct way since it’s our body that’s doing it rather than our intellect - and tears are almost always about love; what love was, what it could have been, what the world does to thwart love. But always about love, I think…. And that’s what Robbie Burns really knew about, and conveys to us.
Happy 2008! Allan
on January 1st, 2008 at 1:20 am
Well said. MLou
on January 2nd, 2008 at 1:15 am
A fitting post for the end of one year, and the beginning of the next. Thanks you for your gentle reflections.
on January 2nd, 2008 at 5:03 pm
Dear Debra,
Thank you for your words - would it be safe to assume you might be the same Debra who has the Blue Santas? If so, I wish to congratulate you, because poor old Santa got pushed around by Coca Cola in a way that is shameful! Now - was there ever a Green santa?
on January 2nd, 2008 at 6:50 pm
That would be me
Your Santa will be coming in the next week.
In the German tradition, there were both blue and green robed St. Nicholas’ . We have seen post cards that were mailed in 1914 that show St. NIcholas in blue and in green robes. Although we haven’t had time to confirm it, we have been told that the color of the robes goes back to the Reformation when the robes of the Pope were red. It was a way to separate from him and the constraints of the Church, We are working on a green glaze and hope to make one for next Christmas.