fish kisses at Christmas

(I sent this as an email back in 2003, and I posted it
as an original blog entry when I started my HornBlog.

Beg your pardon, if you've already read it, but then again
you watch "It's a Wonderful Life" every year at Christmas
time, so perhaps you'll indulge a little Horn tradition here.)

Fish Kisses for Christmas

I heard a song at work the other day, and it made me smile.
Nothing unusual there, I suppose.  That happens to us all the time.
Songs take us back to a time, a place, or a person.
But I was at work, and amid a plethora of
endless Christmas songs,
I heard "Oh Holy Night", and it made me smile, and it gave me a chill.
I even chuckled a little.  And then I felt a pang of guilt for laughing.

But that's part of the memory.

When we were growing up, one of my family traditions was to open the Christmas
presents
on Christmas Eve, and then attend the Christmas Eve church service.
Kirk, Kristin, and I were usually so wound up from sugar and Christmas
festivities that we just could not sit still.  Especially in
anticipation of "Babs" doing her solo of "Oh Holy Night".  In Barb's defense,
she sang an inspired and lovely solo.  It's just that, when you are a kid,
you find humor
in silly things.  When Babs hit the big notes, her eyes got
really wide, and her mouth formed perfectly large, round "O".  For some reason,
this sight just cracked us up, and we could not contain our giggling, much to
the consternation of Mom, as well as, the serious congregation surrounding us,
who constantly gave us "the look".  They tried to make us feel guilty that,
maybe, we were ruining a wonderful Christmas moment with our laughing.
And yet, everytime Babs sang, we had the same reaction.
And we could  practically hear someone
whisper,
"Those darn Hornocker kids!"

Yesterday, as the Horn family got together for Christmas, someone asked
my young nephew, Zack, to do "fish kisses", and I was reminded of a new
Christmas
memory.

Last year, we attended the Christmas Eve service with Mom and Dad, and
Kristin brought  her young twins, Allison and Zachary.  Sadly, Babs was
no longer in the Choir, but as I sat in the pew teaching Zack to make
"fish kisses" with his mouth, making him giggle along the way, it felt
like and old memory coming back.
Something passed on to the next generation.

Thirty-some years ago, someone in the pew behind me"shhh-ed" us,
and gave us dirty looks, because we were fooling around during the
Christmas church service.  How dare I giggle during church.
If I didn't pay attention, I might miss the lessons, and the
meaning of Christmas.

Well, I am now
in my mid-forties, and to this day, whenever I hear
"Oh Holy Night", I smile, and I am awash with a feeling of love,
and the great family memories of many a Christmas that I spent
with my brother, my sisters, my parents, and now my nieces and nephews.

I don't feel guilty anymore, and I don't really think I missed the
lessons, and the meaning of Christmas afterall.

I hope that you all have cherished family memories to laugh about
when you gather for the holidays this year.

Merry Christmas.........jay b. horn