As much as I love the Christmas season, it doesn’t seem right to listen to holiday music when you’re still running your air conditioning. I guess people living in warmer climates are used to that, but it just doesn’t work for me. A few weeks ago, well before Halloween, a local radio station had already switched over to Christmas music, and most retail stores already had a better selection of ugly Christmas sweaters (you know the kind I mean) than they did shirts with short sleeves.
But on a day like today, with my wood stove crackling and fallen leaves swirling on the lawn, I have to say that I’m ready to roll out the carols. This early burst of Christmas cheer could well have been brought on by two days of documenting and marking our great collection of Dept. 56 Dickens Village buildings as we get ready to put together our holiday exhibit at the Physick Estate in Cape May.
Next week at the Mid-Atlantic Center for the Arts & Humanities (MAC), most of us will be engaged in transforming the estate for Christmas. The lawns and gardens will be raked up and trees will be trimmed with thousands of lights. This will be the third year of our undertaking the Carriage House holiday exhibit, where we construct what looks like the underside of a giant Christmas tree, with a wonderland of those Dickens Village buildings and their tiny little people beneath the boughs, complete with a train chugging merrily around the base of the tree. Our Dickens theme continues with some of my favorite scenes and words from “A Christmas Carol” that are sure to bring back lots of memories, especially if your favorite version is the black and white with Alistair Sim. Scrooge looks so much meaner without color in his cheeks.
I have to admit a bit of trepidation as the time draws near to build this exhibit. A lot of blood, sweat and tears, not to mention some un-Christmaslike expletives, go into the process and I know both my back and my knees will be reminding me that I should have come up with this idea 10 years ago. But with lots of help from my friends at MAC and a few long, long days, we’ll pull it together, just in time for Holiday Preview Weekend, Nov. 22-24.
That’s when the Christmas tours start and we welcome our visitors and neighbors throughout the county to travel with us back to a Victorian Christmas. The centerpiece of the weekend is our tree lighting Nov. 23 at 7 p.m. That’s when we light up the 60-foot tree on the lawn, sing carols, sip hot chocolate, and help jump start everyone’s Christmas spirit. We also offer free tours of the Physick House, so you can see how Dr. Physick and his family would have decorated for the holiday. No, you won’t see any inflatable snow globes or fiber optic trees here: This is what an old-fashioned Christmas is all about.
Plan to join us and bring the whole family. Remember those in need, as well, as we will be accepting donations of non-perishable items for the Cape May Community Food Closet. You’ll have plenty of time in the weeks ahead for those hectic shopping trips, so get your holidays off in the true spirit of the season, the old-fashioned, Victorian way.
Jean Barraclough is director of marketing and communications at Mid-Atlantic Center for the Arts & Humanities (MAC)
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