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By Linda Hildonen,
Associate at Schooner Estates Senior Living Community
AUBURN — As the last of the leaves fall from the trees and we get our first glimpses of snow, our thoughts start to turn the holidays and the many traditions they bring. Winter in Maine can be very beautiful, but it’s important to keep in mind how many challenges our ancestors had to overcome when the weather changed each year.
Perhaps this is why our winter traditions take on such special significance: family gatherings and expressions of love and gratefulness helped to keep our hearts and homes warm as the outside world turned colder. Often it is the elders in our families and communities who become the guardians of our traditions. As each generation adjusts to a changing world, it can seem that the chasm between the old and the young grows larger.
Tradition plays in important part in bridging that gap, giving people of all ages a connection to their common heritage. Betty Ann Cushman, a resident of Hebron who is soon to make the move to Schooner Estates Senior Living Community in Auburn, speaks about her connection to her European roots:
“My grandmother is from Germany, and I still have relatives there.” She explained that in Germany, Christmas Eve is a very important night. “My family used to try to sing ‘Silent Night’ in German at midnight, at the same time we knew my family in Germany would be singing it.”
Betty remembers going to the candlelight Mass with her family when she was a child, a tradition she continues. She also started new traditions with her own family. “With our children, we started a tradition of baking a birthday cake for Jesus.”
Tradition can also help you to feel connected when you can’t be with your family. “I love everything about the holidays here,” said Lindsey Maletto, speaking about Schooner Estates, where she works as a hostess. Lindsey said that she, her brother and their children spend Thanksgiving fighting over the turkey skin at her father’s house in Hartford. “But most of my family is far away, in Oklahoma.”
She said that her coworkers and the seniors she sees every day at work help to make her feel more at home during the holidays. “It’s a new tradition to spend the holidays with my Schooner family.”
This season, take some time to reflect on how the traditions you practice make you feel. Do you feel closer to ancestors? Do traditions help you to bond with your loved ones? Are your favorite traditions those that have been handed down for generations, or are they the ones that you helped to shape?
All of our many holiday customs help us to celebrate each other, with love and gratefulness. Here’s hoping that the warmth they create lasts through the winter, and longer still.
