A month ago was too early, though I’ll admit I sneaked an aural peak and listened to the last two choruses. But a few nights ago, I started from the beginning. It was November. I’d waited long enough. It was time for The Messiah.

Let others drag out their Christmas decorations a week after Halloween, let retailers stock the shelves with tinsel and ornaments and candy canes. If I’m going to rush the season, it will be for only one reason: to hear Handel’s great oratorio.

The piece is always just a playlist away on my little iPod. It’s all I can do to keep myself from listening to it all year long. But civilization has its constraints, and so I hold myself back. One can’t play a piece every single day and still love it (the scores of LaLa Land and Les Miserables being prime examples). I want more than that for The Messiah.

And so, I waited. I didn’t listen in April, and I didn’t listen in July. To my own persistent, “Are we there yet?” I said, “Not quite — but soon.” But finally I could wait no more. And so, on November 6, almost a month before Advent, I pushed play.

And there were the familiar pulsing strings, the pause, and then … the tenor: “Comfort ye, comfort ye, my people.” I felt the weight of 11 months roll off my shoulders, the cares and troubles of other seasons. They’re all behind me now. It’s time for The Messiah.