Christmas Wishes

While the way you celebrate Christmas may not be the same way we celebrate ours, our culture has set out some specific traditions most people keep in mind for the “perfect” holiday.

However, it’s quite easy to see there are, for instance, many parts of our country which will not be seeing a White Christmas. Here in California, I won’t—not unless I hop in the car and take a three hour drive to the mountains.

It’s likely the same for the state of Florida, where our Sarah Ann Broyles went to marry Rupert Charles McClellan and settle, ultimately, in Tampa.

It seemed almost anticlimactic, then, to uncover a Christmas card from Sarah and Rupert among the family papers passed down to me from my aunt. The card certainly didn’t evoke any traditional holiday images—no chestnuts roasting by the fire, no sleigh bells jingling, and definitely no white Christmas.

The card didn’t even look Christmas-y. Instead of the traditional evergreens, the cover featured an orange grove—appropriate, in retrospect, as my great grandmother was an astute businesswoman in her own right, and owned some orange groves, herself.

The greeting on the card’s cover didn’t sound like a Christmas greeting, either. It announced, plain and simple:

Greetings from Florida.

Palm trees swaying by the balmy shore might not be your idea of the traditional Christmas greeting—well, unless you live in Florida, or perhaps “down under” in Australia or New Zealand. No matter where you spend your Christmas, though, I wish for you the same simple greeting sent years ago by “Daddy McClellan and Mama.”

Greeting you

With sincere good wishes

For a truly Merry Christmas

And a very Happy New Year