Have you ever stopped to wonder when something you always do became something you always do?
I was thinking about that recently because traditions are funny things. We tend to think of them as something established—a special meal that's been made for years, a place we visit every summer, something our parents did when we were children that we continued when we grew up. But not every tradition comes with a long history. Sometimes they start so quietly that we don't even realize we've created one until someone asks, "Are we doing that again this year?"
That's exactly how one of my favorite Christmas traditions started.
Years ago, I decided I wanted my kids to read A Christmas Carol. There wasn't some grand plan behind it, and I certainly wasn't thinking about starting a family tradition. I just wanted them to experience the story at least once, and rather than handing them the book and telling them to read it, I thought it would be more fun if we read it together.
So, on December 1st, I made hot chocolate, we sat down together, and we started reading. We took turns reading aloud, working our way through the story a little at a time as Christmas got closer. I remember enjoying that time together, but I didn't think of it as anything more than that. It was simply something nice to do with my kids during December.
Then the next year came around, and they wanted to do it again.
I hadn't planned on making it an annual event, but apparently they had decided otherwise. So out came A Christmas Carol, we made the hot chocolate, and we read it together again. After that, it just became something we did. I couldn't tell you exactly when it officially crossed the line from "something we did last year" into "our Christmas tradition," because I don't think there ever was a moment when anyone declared it one.
We just kept coming back to it.
Now my daughter wants to continue the tradition when she has a family of her own, and I think that's the part that makes me look at that first December a little differently. I wasn't trying to create a childhood memory she would someday want to recreate. I wasn't thinking twenty years ahead or wondering whether my kids would remember the evening. I wanted some quality time with them, so I made hot chocolate and opened a book.
Somehow, that was enough.
It makes me wonder how many of our traditions begin in exactly the same way. Maybe you made pancakes one Sunday morning and everyone enjoyed it so much that Sunday slowly became pancake day. Maybe you stopped for ice cream after an outing once, and the next time you went someone asked, "Aren't we getting ice cream?" Suddenly you realize that apparently these two things go together now.
It could be a movie you watch every Halloween, the first cup of coffee on the porch when spring finally arrives, or the same restaurant you visit whenever an old friend comes to town. It could be something as simple as taking a certain route because you like the view or buying yourself one new ornament every December.
Traditions don't even have to involve other people. I think that's easy to forget because we so often talk about family traditions, but some of the little rituals we create just for ourselves can become every bit as meaningful. Maybe there's something you do every birthday, a place you visit when you need to think, or a small way you mark the beginning of a new season. Nobody else has to participate for it to matter.
And every one of those traditions, no matter how long we've been doing it, had a first time.
Someone cooked the meal for the first time. Someone suggested the trip. Someone turned on the movie. Someone poured the hot chocolate and opened the book. At the time, nobody necessarily knew that this was the beginning of something. It was simply what they felt like doing that day.
I think that's my favorite part of all of this, because it means traditions aren't only things we inherit from the past. We're still creating them now, probably without realizing it.
Something you did this summer might happen again next summer. Maybe something that made everyone laugh at Christmas last year will be requested again this year. Maybe you and a friend have been doing something together for so long that neither of you remembers how it started. Or maybe something you did for the very first time last week will somehow still be part of your life twenty years from now.
We really have no way of knowing which things will stick, and I don't think we need to. Trying to turn every enjoyable moment into a tradition would probably take some of the magic out of it. Sometimes it's enough to enjoy something and, when the opportunity comes around again, think, You know what? I'd like to do that again.
Maybe that's really how traditions are made. Not because we set out to create something meaningful, but because something was meaningful enough that we wanted to return to it.
That's certainly what happened with A Christmas Carol.
And somewhere along the way, without any of us noticing exactly when it happened, something we did became something we do. Maybe there's something like that in your life already. Or maybe the first time hasn't happened yet.
Either way, I rather like the idea that some ordinary day, while we're busy simply enjoying ourselves, a new tradition might quietly be beginning.