For most folks, Thanksgiving marks the beginning of the Christmas season. For me, growing up in a Catholic family, the holiday season usually began a couple of days later … on the first Sunday of Advent. For the unfamiliar, Advent, from the latin adventus, meaning “coming” is the four Sundays before Christmas, culminating on Christmas Eve.

I grew up in a small town in the center of the UP in the 1960s. A town which didn’t have cable TV (still doesn’t), shopping, (save for Larson’s General Store and the Rock CO-OP), a mall, movie theatre or any significant entertainment. That first Sunday of Advent was the signal that the Christmas season had started because there really wasn’t any other evidence.

Because of the nature of my father’s job, my family didn’t do any Christmas decorating or ev

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