The End of Magic: Part Four

Helping others should be a part of our lives, not just part of some occasion, but a season of goodwill means different things to different people.

Some see goodwill as a spiritual occasion, while some will see it as an occasion for spirits: a chance to get together for some competitive cooking and to make merry. With technology increasingly becoming a substitute for direct communication, a few people will probably even make merry on Facebook this year. But variety is a spice in the meal of life, and we are free to consume it as we choose; and if I'm home on that day I enjoy eating good holiday fare, too.

It also serves as an opportunity to watch my favourite films. After good cuisine, books and indoor plumbing, the movies are probably humanity's best invention. And one of the films to watch in the spirit of goodwill, and I'm sure I'm not alone in this, is Frank Capra's 1946 black and white Hollywood movie, It's a Wonderful Life. Overall it is a dark film, although critics might get cynical over too much schmaltz, sentimentality, or snow. But there is nothing phony about a saying hung under a picture of the hero's father in that moving picture: You can only take with you what you give away. And if we hold on to the magic of doing good - of helping others by 'giving away' - the good we do can physically live on after we're gone.

Another reason for the soft-spot I hold for Capra's cinematic parable is that at university my nickname was Clarence, after the guardian angel in the film, because, so my friends would inform me, I have the 'faith of a child' when it comes to goodwill. I put my hand up to that; I do have a simple faith in the things I believe in.

When we look past our screens to the world beyond it, in celebrating goodwill we need to look past the currencies that move us today; because the financial situation will go up and go down, and the British snow clusters will give way to a period of familiar mild winters again. The snow is a harbinger of the cold, but it will not be here forever; is it so naive to want some enjoyment out of it while it lasts?

The temporary problems we're having as a country with the weather is not merely a failure to connect with our habitat, but with ourselves and each other. We're not even sure if we can help shovel the snow off our neighbour's driveway any more. It's a sad state of affairs when we are too cautious to look our neighbour in the eye and offer a hand to help. So, why not make these days to really remember with a smile and a helping hand? The winter season will be cold regardless, and such days are as brief as the heavy snowfall destined to become a statistical memory in the virtual pages of some history book downloaded to our children's e-Readers.

But, however nostalgic this year's last snow has made me feel, I'm a firm believer in looking forward, too. As a year's end marks the beginning of a new one, quilted in patterns of the final and inaugural, the nature of December shares many aspects with its neighbour January; marked as a period of retrospect, it's a chance to look forward as well.

And from all the important lessons to be taken from the past, the most fundamental one is that we shouldn't live in it, but learn from it. We shouldn't be so emotionally engaged with the past that we cannot form a proper view of the present. Nostalgia is a trip best kept short, and taken only if we're emotionally grounded in the natural cycle of the future. It shouldn't be used as a stick to beat up the present, but to prod us into the future with hope, because endings always bring new beginnings; the future always comes out of the past.

Published 22 December, 2010

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but not saying the good old days, for our children good old days now.