I just got back from the regressive dinner I organized for the youth group. For those of you that are feeling a little slow today, a regressive dinner is the opposite of a progressive dinner. A progressive dinner consists of a group of people starting at one person’s home where appetizers are served. After that course they all head over to a house that has the salad. Then to a house for the main course. Finally the group ends up at a home where dessert is served and the group goes home from there. But we didn’t have a progressive dinner, ours was regressive. We started with dessert and ended with appetizers. Lots of fun, though I must point out that my stomach was a bit confused.
At the last home we had appetizers and also had what the youth group has traditionally called a “dirty Santa.” I’ve always known it as a “white elephant” gift exchange but that term was foreign to them all. I just think it’s hilarious that no one but me noticed the fairly obvious innuendo in the term “dirty Santa.” I digress.
Here’s a picture of the gift I ended up with. I think it’s supposed to be a kind of incense burner but everyone said it looks like a pipe. I tend to agree.
As we were driving between homes, going from one course to another, I was playing Christmas music on the radio. It was great fun because the youth knew all the words and sang along at the top of their voices. I love Christmas music. There’s a radio station down here, 94.9, that plays Christmas music 24/7 from the day after Thanksgiving until December 25th. I hate to admit this but I usually have Christmas music on the radio all day long. I just can’t get enough of that stuff. It’s like a drug and I’m a junkie. I’m a Christmas music junkie. There’s rarely any new Christmas music put out though. Mostly all I hear is present-day artists remaking old Christmas songs. They may throw in a new beat or a guitar riff but for the most part they’re the same songs I heard growing up. There’s something comforting about hearing those songs. It’s undefinable but almost tangible. It was in thinking about this intangible quality that it hit me. Maybe these senior adults in churches who are insisting on singing all the old hymns every Sunday morning instead of the new fangled worship choruses aren’t so crazy after all. Maybe they just get a strange sense of comfort in hearing those old songs they grew up with; much like I’m comforted by hearing those old Christmas songs I grew listening to. Kind of puts the whole worship-war in a new perspective for me.
All in all I’d say I was truly blessed through our regressive dinner. That dirty Santa.
