My house looks naked. It’s been bare since I left for college. Without me around to pull out the boxes, untangle the web of lights, check to make sure they all work, and then bring them outside, it doesn’t get done. I assumed the job when I was younger, handing my dad the lights while he stood on the ladder and stapled them to the house. In those first years, I electrocuted myself twice, though never enough to go to the hospital.

In one of the last years of putting up Christmas lights with my Dad, the ladder failed us for the first time. It slid out from underneath my Dad, and he crashed to the icy pavement, his hand jammed under the rungs. Only half the house was lit that year.

For the first time this holiday season, I truly noticed the attention, and lack of, that people place on their homes during this time of year. And I can’t help but think to myself, when did they find the time? The motivation? The desire? Then I remembered that for most of my childhood, I believed that Christmas wouldn’t feel the same without a house sparkling in the night and a tree topped with my Grandmother’s homemade angel. It’s what I had always known. And it’s what my family had always known.

“Sam, it’s tradition,” my sister said when I admitted that I didn’t want to put up Christmas lights, and I really didn’t care if we bought a tree. Call me Scrouge, but I when the Christmas season came around this year, I wasn’t in the mood to put in the extra effort. Without an understanding of why we follow certain customs year after year, it all seemed pointless. I needed to do some research.

No, I’ve never actually made out with someone under mistletoe, but I have willingly dragged an evergreen into my living room, covering myself in needles and sap. I am proud of the fact that no one has heard me sing a Christmas carol on their doorstep, but I do enjoy occasionally switching my radio to the local station that has only played Christmas music since the day after Thanksgiving. We all repeat the same traditions year after year and why? Well, because they’re traditions. But to be honest, I have no idea why there is a massive tree in my house.

After some research, I found some answers. About 1,000 years ago St. Boniface, a Christian missionary, stumbled upon some pagans in Germany who were worshipping an oak tree. Obviously, St. Boniface chopped it down in response to their ritual. From the roots of the oak supposedly sprung a fir tree and he believed it to be a sign of his faith. It was really in the 16th century, though, that trees were actually brought inside homes around Christ’s birthday.

But Christians aren’t the only ones who make a big deal out of evergreens. The Egyptians believed they were a symbol of victory over death and worshipped them in the wintertime. The Romans decorated their houses with evergreens during Saturnalia, a feast in honor of Saturn, the god of agriculture. The Druids, a group of woods priests in ancient Britain, intertwined evergreens, holly, and mistletoe in their winter solstice ceremonies. The Middle Ages saw the Germans and Scandinavians honoring these trees in hopes that they would bring them out of winter.

When these groups of Europeans immigrated to America their traditions were slow to spread in a country where Boston students were sometimes expelled for skipping school on Christmas. But by 1851, the Christmas tree market was up and running. Farmer Mark Carr carried two ox sleds full of evergreen trees into New York City and sold every single one. Fifty years later twenty percent of American households had a tree.

And what about those Christmas lights that caused me electrocution and trauma? Apparently, when people first started decorating their trees, many used candles. Martin Luther is believed to have lit an evergreen with candles to create the image of heaven shining over Bethlehem. Thankfully, electric Christmas lights were invented in 1882, avoiding the extreme risk of house fires. And from there, people just couldn’t get enough of them. The festive lights moved them from the tree to their yard and finally to their rooftops.

Since 1931, the Rockefeller Christmas Tree has been lighted annually in early December in New York City. This year, the tree was lit on December 3rd and the will remain this way until January 9, 2009. Around the country, much smaller trees will light the homes of 30 to 35 million families.

I never really thought too much before stockings. It seems a bit greedy that children expect Santa to fill their stockings in addition to leaving presents under the tree. Though they give parents more empty wallets responsibility and on Christmas Eve, the stockings did originate from a sentimental story.

Thousands of years ago, a kind nobleman became a widow with three daughters. The women worked hard to keep a stable household without their mother. When the time came for them to be married, their father could not afford the large dowries. One evening, after washing their stockings, the three daughters hung them on the fireplace to dry. Feeling generous and moved by their good spirits, St. Nicholas came down the chimney and left a bag of gold in each stocking. With these gifts the women could now afford to get married. The tradition continued ever since as children who have been “nice” wait for them to be filled by Santa Clause.

There’s the classic tradition of the fat bearded man in the red suit, squeezing his way down our chimney, eating our cookies, and leaving an abundance of toys. We can once again thank our fellow Europeans for carrying Saint Nicholas into our country. Columbus actually named a Haitian port after him in 1942. However the first colonists, mainly Puritans and Prostestant reformers, were anti-Saint Nick and certainly weren’t responsible for his widespread fame. It’s believed that it was the Dutch who had a St. Nicholas figurehead on their ship to America; their first colony worshipped him, dedicated their first church to him, and thought that he slid down their chimneys bearing gifts.

The New York Historical Society acknowledged St. Nicholas as the patron saint of the society and the city when it was founded in 1804. Washington Irving joined in 1809 and on St. Nicholas Day he published Knickerbocker’s History of New York, which referenced a jolly St. Nick, an elf-like man with a clay pipe. “A Visit from St. Nicholas,” a poem written in 1823, is now celebrated as “The Night before Christmas.” Later, in 1863, Thomas Nast started to draw a series of black-and-white pictures of “Sancte Claus” or “Santa Claus” in Harper’s Weekly. These images were primarily based on Irving’s work and descriptions from the popular poem. The new name evolved phonetically from the German “Sankt Niklaus” and the Dutch “Sinterklaas.”

The media has changed the image of Santa Clause over the years, but it has always stayed true to this idea of a round, jolly man, smoking his pipe and spreading Christmas cheer. Originally, St. Nicholas was the patron saint of children and loved the poor, which idealizes how Christians should act themselves. I like this idea, though it’s hard to believe that most consider the true meaning of Santa and his work.

If less people were ignorant of this Santa tradition and of simply all traditions in general, perhaps we could calm down with the Christmas lists, quit stretching our already too-tight budgets, and do something Christian, like buying gifts for a family who can’t afford any. Though I do understand that bringing the idea of Christ into Christmas isn’t always easy. I still have to remember to hold my tongue and say “Happy Holidays” to strangers, and I’m not looking forward to the crowded church on Christmas day. Besides Easter, it’s the only other day I can’t find a seat.

Since most of us don’t find ourselves in touch with the true meaning of the season, it’s understandable that we carry on traditions without a clue as to why we’re doing it. No, the Christmas tree didn’t solely come from pagans, nor did it only originate in ancient Egypt, but somehow it found its way into my living room. Still, even if I didn’t know about the history of the tree, I’d still be smiling every time the sun goes down, and the tree lights up. It’s tradition.

So this year, I’ll decorate the tree, spread some lights on the bushes in our front yard, and help prepare dinner for the family. No one in my family is exchanging gifts this year, and it’s truly lifted a great load considering we all don’t have the money. Of course I’ll miss unwrapping presents and watching as others open their gifts from me, but it’s not worth the stress and it doesn’t seem as necessary to me anymore. Our plans are to enjoy the simplicity of being together. We’ve started our own tradition.