I love the holiday season! This year is extra special with our return to Hays, providing the opportunity to revisit the familiar traditions and experience new traditions. I love the church services, the outdoor lights, and the Christmas trees – I have four in the president’s residence, one in my office, one in the outer office, and so many more throughout the building, campus and city. Bill and I drive around at night and look at all of the beautiful outdoor lights.

I especially love the holiday season because it creates so many special moments for us to gather with our friends and family and to think a bit about our blessings, purpose, and aspirations. I always think of the holiday season as inclusive of Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year’s. The three events seem to transition both thematically and rapidly – signaling, paradoxically, both a time of heightened activity as well as a meaningful time for personal reflection.

Thanksgiving is such a great time for communities and families to come together to give thanks for their many blessings. Returning to Hays America has reminded me about the strong relationships and good people who call this area home. Clearly, a hallmark of this university is a strong town and gown relationship. Fort Hays State is blessed by a long legacy of strong leaders, extremely talented faculty, staff who care deeply about our students, and a community that rallies its support around the university in a myriad of ways.

My Thanksgiving blessings list may have been longer than Santa’s list. The Reader’s Digest version of my list included our generous donors, our students who choose FHSU, legislators who believe in higher education, and the quality of the innovative education our faculty deliver. A few blessings witnessed this fall include an 18th consecutive year of record enrollment growth, partial restoration of higher education base funding, top passing rates on national exams, and a $100 million Journey Campaign – which was supposed to be a stretch goal – outpacing the timeline.

And then, Christmas!

Christmas – a time to enjoy more beautiful decorations, holiday music, and even the snow. A time to again express our gratitude for the people in our lives as we exchange cards, gifts, and encouraging words. I also appreciate the fact that both the Thanksgiving and Christmas holiday facilitate a little extra generosity as we often provide a little extra food, gifts, and other treasures to those in need. I am so happy to be part of a community who actively engages in philanthropy and service to others all year round.

I really appreciate the person responsible for coining the phrase: the reason for the season. For me, Christmas is such a great opportunity to think deeply about my purpose – do I live my life as I have been called to do? What changes do I need to make? As I ponder about the life I lead, I realize a new year is quickly approaching.

A new year always brings new hopes, dreams, and aspirations. I once read that at the most basic level, our dreams, hopes, and wishes determine how we live our lives. Our aspirations are rooted in a strong desire to achieve something noble. Authors Jim Kouzes and Barry Posner share that if we live each day as if we matter, we offer up our unique legacy. By offering up our own unique legacy, we make the world we inhabit a better place than we found it.

This is precisely why the holiday season is the perfect time to say “thank you” not only to our donors, who have changed the lives of generations of students, but also to everyone whose aspirations lead to a better world. In Hays America I experience a community brimming with people who live their lives generously and with kindness, who change lives, offer hope and live with integrity, and who inspire me every day to live more generously.

I am like most people.  I tend to do the same things the same way, over and over. Even in church, I gravitate to the east side, sitting in about the same pew each Sunday.

Sunday (December 9) I was running a little late. So as to disturb as few people as possible, I slipped in on the west side of the United Methodist Church, and sat in a west side pew.  

Many of you know that the Hays Methodist Church has beautiful stained glass windows. By moving to a new location, I was able to see a set of windows that I do not ordinarily see—the east windows.

This was not the first time I had this view.  While the view was the same as it was on those rare other occasions, it was just as spectacular, as if it was a new sight.

As I sat there, with the church decorated for Christmas, I thought about Christmas past and my family.

I always lived miles from my grandparents—the closest being 250 miles, the longest, 560 miles.  But as a child, regardless of the distance, my parents packed us up and we headed to Fort Worth for our annual celebration.  Even after my parents divorced, my mom and step-father continued the tradition.  

And every time, every time, we were greeted with my grandparents coming out of their house, whether early morning or late at night.  My grandmother would pull me into her, hugging and kissing me, telling me how “handsome” I was.  My sister would go to my grandfather, “Poppa”, who would pick her up in his giant arms and call her “sissy.”  Then we switched.  In the house we were met with smells of macaroni and cheese, pumpkin pie, turkey dressing, and much more.

After I married Barbara, we had three sons.  Barb’s parents lived in Wichita.  They had their own traditions for Christmas.  When we went to their home, we were met with the bustle of preparations for a large gathering.  Many foods and their smells were of Mennonite origin, including bohne-beroggi and pfeffernusse. Soon a turkey would be placed in the smoker, and Barb’s dad and I would check it throughout the night to be sure it was ready for the noon meal the next day.  Tradition.  

After we married, each year Barbara and I coordinated visits between my grandparents and my wife’s parents.  Many times it saw us on the road on Christmas Eve, Christmas Day or the day after Christmas.  And it was with three little active boys in the Suburban for hours!  But we made it to both places, every year.  
Gosh, it was hard.  And it was special and wonderful and meaningful. It was just another Christmas.

Sunday, as I sat in church, all those memories rushed at me.  Barb’s parents, and my grandparents and parents, are now gone.  I wish I had one more Christmas with all of them—just another Christmas. But our memories, and those of my sons, are still here.  They still warm me.  

As I was looking out the east windows of our church, through the stained glass, with the sun streaming in, we sang a song “People, Look to the East.”  Just as we finished the last line of the song, the dark shadow of several birds flew by the windows headed to the North.  I felt like it was my grandparents, my parents, and Barb’s parents, flying free, but letting me know they are still with us.

Christmas is here again.  As the stain glass windows, it is the same.  But I hope you will look at it from a different angle and see how spectacular it is.  I hope you will appreciate that all the effort you put in to be together is worth it. Now and for generations to come.

Merry Christmas.  

Randy Clinkscales of Clinkscales Elder Law Practice, PA, Hays, Kansas, is an elder care attorney, practicing in western Kansas. To contact him, please send an email to [email protected]. Disclaimer: The information in the column is for general information purposes and does not constitute legal advice. Each case is different and outcomes depend on the fact of each case and the then applicable law. For specific questions, you should contact a qualified attorney.