This year, as we do every year, husband Sam and I, together with a huge crew of talented family and friends, performed my one-hour reader’s theater adaptation of Dickens’ A Christmas Carol at local residential care facilities and retirement homes, celebrating the season with a tradition that’s nearly 20 years old.  It started as a way to cheer me up during my first Christmas away from my parents.  The Scrooge story was a long-standing tradition with my family and a favorite of my grandmother, Jeanette Porter.  Nobody writes dialogue and brilliantly memorable characters quite like Dickens.

    The first year, we did the show with a cast of 6 adults and 2 children under the age of 8 and a 20 minute rehearsal just prior to performance.  Since then, we’ve performed with casts from 6 people to 60 people.  We have one rehearsal that functions as a huge holiday party, where we laugh, sing, share stories and read through the script.  People just show up for the performances 15 minutes beforehand and I cast the show based on who’s there, with my handy-dandy spreadsheet (see photo above).  The story itself is about connecting with your fellow human beings, and that’s what our tradition is about, too.

    For Sam and I and so many of the folks who participate, this tradition has come to define Christmas.  “And so, as Tiny Tim observed, God bless us, every one!”