Christmas is a traditional holiday that contains more traditions than raisins in a fruitcake.

One of these traditions involves sending holiday greeting cards. Nobody knows exactly when this custom began, but it’s entirely possible that its origins can be traced all the way back to caveman days.

“What that?” caveman Og asks his mate one day as he returns home from a hard day of hunting for and running from saber-toothed tigers.

“It’s a greeting card,” replies his mate, holding up what appears to be a shingle that has been festooned with twigs and dried berry juice.

“Hunh,” grunts Og. “Looks like shingle with berry juice. What it for?”

“It’s for wishing happy holidays to all of our friends and family, of course! Don’t you know anything?”

“Hunh,” Og replies. “How do cards get to all those people?”

“We’ll seal them in colorful envelopes, put festive stamps on them and mail them,” says his mate. “Which reminds me. Come here and put out your tongue.”

That hypothesis may or may not hold water, but people have certainly been sending and receiving Christmas cards since long before any of us were born. I have proof of this thanks to a handful of Christmas cards that my Grandma Nelson received back in the early 1900s.

Some of them are quite elegant. One features an oval portrait of a young lady who is wearing a golden crown. Sprigs of holly are scattered tastefully around the frame.

Others are somewhat troubling. One depicts a child — I can’t tell if it’s a boy or a girl — standing beside a Christmas tree that’s adorned with candles. If you were to ask me, I would say that the combination of a young child, open flames and a combustible tree is a recipe for catastrophe. But maybe kids were less klutzy back then.

Another card is a bit strange. A mother watches benevolently as her little daughter teaches tricks to the family pooch. For some reason, the dog has a haircut that causes it to resemble a miniature lion. At the bottom of the card is a poem that implies that the girl knows more than she should. It seems like a weird way to send season’s greetings.

My wife is an inveterate greeting card sender. She is very organized and keeps a list of card recipients. Nothing pleases her more than receiving fistfuls of cards in return.

The exception to this is to receive a card late in the season from someone who wasn’t on her list.

“Oh my gosh!” she might exclaim, “I can’t believe it! How could they do this to us?”

“What’s wrong with sending you a Christmas card?” I might reply. “I thought you liked getting cards.”

“I do, but not from someone who hasn’t already gotten a card from us. It’s too late now to send them a card that will get there in time. I can’t believe they would do this to us!”

“The scoundrels,” I might reply. “Who would do such a rotten thing as sending a Christmas card?”

Being a good husband, I will help my wife when she performs acts of mass mailing. We have a system. Her writing is legible while mine looks like someone who is breaking in a new ballpoint pen, so she addresses and signs all the cards. My job is to stuff and seal and stamp the envelopes. It’s a typical management and labor arrangement.

There are hazards associated with my job. Paper cuts have been known to happen, sometimes resulting in a boo-boo so severe that it requires soothing words and a My Little Pony band-aid.

The advent of self-sticking postage stamps has greatly reduced my workload. We are too cheap, I mean, thrifty to buy self-sealing envelopes, so I have to do a fair bit of licking. I have learned the hard way that paper cuts on the tongue can be particularly painful. And that band-aids don’t stick very well to wet surfaces.

Yes, I could use a damp sponge or simply wet a fingertip in a bowl of water. But where’s the sport in that? Where’s the sense of danger? Besides, I tend to overdo it when I manually wet an envelope’s Stickum. The recipient might conclude that their card had gone through a carwash.

There’s nothing like the sense of accomplishment that one gets after finishing a stack of greeting cards. And there’s nothing better for getting the taste of glue out of your mouth than a mug of hot chocolate.

And I’ll know when we receive a late non-list greeting card because my wife will say, “Quick, come here! And put out your tongue.”

— Jerry’s book, Dear County Agent Guy, is available at http://Workman.com and in bookstores nationwide.