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Writer's pictureRobert E.L. Walters

The Mixed Bag that is Christmas

Christmas is many things to many people. For me, it has always been a moving target that changes throughout the years.

After my mother's parents died, we slipped into a routine that lasted for many years. Each Thanksgiving my godparents and my cousins came to Maryland, and every 23rd to 28th of December, we went to New York.


Of course, this changed a bit over the years. My sister took over Thanksgiving from my mother; my godparents moved to Nevada necessitating their packing-in as guests along with everyone else at the house in Staten Island. I joined the Navy, became partnered, and began the perennial waltz between families and holidays that comes with any marriage or partnership. It all changed; slowly, subtly and with little fanfare.


Perhaps that's the lesson I take from all holidays-- that they change. At one time, pining for holidays as they were would depress me (or worse yet, fill me with hopeless despair) but not anymore. After more than half-a-century on this planet I realize that the number of Christmases that are near to identical for me are about fifteen total, or 25%. Semi Identical (Class One) would be five more, or another 9%, Semi Identical (Class Two) would be seven, or 13%, Semi Identical (Class Three) would be five, or another 9%. Thus 56% of my lifetime of Christmases bears some resemblance to another Christmas. The other 44% however, are all over the place!


There was the Christmas of 1989 when I was in Boot Camp, and Santa came through our spaces on Christmas Eve with candy canes that our company commanders promptly confiscated and destroyed in front of us on the centerboard with a rubber mallet (they had done the same all week with cookies ill-advisedly sent to our spaces, even by our sister company). There was the Christmas of 2002 where, unbeknownst to anyone save my cousin's wife who was keen enough to figure it out on her own, that a ten-year relationship had ended, but we had decided to spare everyone the news until after the New Year. There were the Christmases of 2003 and 2009 where I had pneumonia, and had all I could do to feed myself let alone feel merry and bright, or the Christmas of 2008 where I took advantage of the laundromat being empty to do a slew of new bedding.


Then there was that cold and windy Christmas in 1995 when we decided to have dinner in a restaurant we loved on Lincoln Road in Miami. Rain blinds drawn and the space heaters cranking at full force, it was by far the worst Christmas Day I have ever experienced anywhere in my life. It was a steamy, sallow, depressing meal, with colored lights grimly distorted through the plastic drapes and a deafening, driving rain-- and a mood made more macabre by everyone (unconvincingly) trying to be forcefully cheerful. I have never eaten out on Christmas day since nor would I be inclined to ever do so again!


The point of all this is simple; in 2020, many people (especially here in Puerto Rico) will be suffering from Christmas withdraw. Its natural of course; Christmas is a drug we take in ever increasing doses from Thanksgiving weekend until day X (depending on where we live) and then we take it all away with nary a taper. The effects of this drug and its withdraw exacerbate over the years as well. As each grandparent, parent, aunt, uncle, sibling, cousin, or spouse pass from the scene, they take a little of the holiday with them; a little of the joy, and that which remains becomes stronger and more concentrated in its memory.


But we can be stronger than that. As the Ghost of Christmas Present tells Ebeneezer Scrooge in"A Christmas Carol," the nature of Christmas should permeate the whole year, not just Christmas Day. With that said, we should remember that family and friends enhance a holiday, they do not make it. That is our perception of things; our egos speaking; it is not based on reality. If we keep Christmas in our hearts this year, we can find tidings of comfort and joy no matter where we are located, or how far distant we may be from our fellow man.


Let not our hearts be troubled.

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