During the reign of the evil White Witch, Narnia’s curse is that Christmas is always coming but never arrives.
The metaphor is instantly understandable, especially from a young person’s perspective: imagine that sense of immense anticipation without the handy countdown of an advent calendar or the certainty that Santa Claus is coming to town.
It’s not such a stretch to apply that metaphor to the world’s current situation, is it? As we all await the development and distribution of a vaccine and some sort of transition to some kind of new life, there’s fervent anticipation but no clear timeline.
The spell is lifted in Narnia, of course, just as it ultimately will be in this case. But, between now and then, we all have an opportunity to re-learn how to wait, and how to deal with our expectations in the meantime.
And that situation describes an awful lot more of the history of human experience than a tidy 24-day march to a pile of new toys.
Colin Steele 