In an old cardboard box that replaced the shoe box used up until last year when it finally wore through the bottom I keep one of my familie's most precious Christmas traditions. It contains the assorted pieces of a nativity scene that has been my responsibility to arrange for display and tend to since I was about three or four years old. I took this responsibility very seriously as a child and often spent hours arranging, then rearranging, then acting out the scene before rearranging yet again the staging of the nativity. But this cardboard box nativity is special. It is absolutely, undeniably, certifiably one of a kind. It is not so much one set as the accumulated pieces and parts of numerous old sets combined together as parts and pieces went missing. So Mary and Joseph are from one old, handcrafted set but Baby Jesus had to be replaced last year after suffering a severe compound fracture to his arm and some skull lacerations when making a dive out of the manger. We have four wisemen instead of the traditional three, because those are how many are left over from all of the sets and I can not choose one to leave out. The wise men are in various scale sizes, making one look like he has a serious growth hormone problem and another as if he is from the same tribe as Goliath. I figure my wise men bring Gold, Frankensence, Myrrh, and the one thing every new parent needs - free diapers! Then there is one shepherd with a sheep and a free standing sheep of a slightly different shade of white paint...he's been rolling around in the mud. For the ambiance there is a single cow remaining and a single donkey (well, we call it a donkey but it could be a horse I guess...who would invite an Ass to the birth of Jesus?). The angel is missing the gold from her wings and her halo is chipped and dinged. Finally, there is a so-not-proportional bright green wooden pine tree with snow that I made when I was about eight years old at Church and insisted must join in the merriment. My nativity has some character to it, it has been around the block and been knocked around by life, it has been pieced together from pieces and parts that otherwise would have been thrown away, and it has been given a place of great honor every year. I love the imperfections and would have no idea how to set up a perfect, everything matches, nothing is damaged nativity. Just like I love the imperfections in my life and would have no idea how to live an absolutely perfect, unscarred, unmarred, undamaged life. In both the nativity and my life, the quirks, the marks from wear and love and from little hands holding tight, the collection of pieces that failed to fit in  and so were supposed to be discarded, the journeys from home to home, the ragtag menagerie is beautiful in my eyes. Creating that magical scene is something I look forward to every year, especially if I get ahold of some spray on snow, glitter, and straw/hay! Although this year I hope we can make it through the season without any serious trama, although I do have that spare wise man who can step in as an understudy.