Remember how the first Christmas story started with a journey? Everybody had to go back to the town of their birth, it seems, to be counted in Caesar’s census.

This brings us to Bethlehem. And yet the story goes on from there, all through history, such that when we celebrate Christmas, most of us think of home, wherever that may be.

In the year that’s nearing its close, some might feel they’ve seen a little too much of home, after health precautions kept us pretty close to there, more than we can ever remember. It’s not that version of home that calls to us, though, when the Christmas season is here.

This is a time for the home we feel in our hearts, where everyone we love is included, no matter where they might be just now.

To Give and to Receive

That’s why this Christmas – possibly more than ever before – a lot of us are shopping in our hometown stores. It seems like a way of giving back to our homes, by doing business with those local merchants who risk so much, who stake their family’s future on the role they play in making this a community.

If convenience alone were the measure, nobody would have to go out the front door anymore. A few clicks, a successful remembering of what password you gave a particular site, some credit card digits, and whoosh. A package will be delivered to your loved one – by somebody you probably don’t know.

A friend’s grandchild said his choice for Halloween costume last October was either going to be blue or brown – a Post Office or a UPS delivery person. Says something we’re not entirely glad to hear, when a four-year-old thinks the bringer of good things is somebody unrelated.