Twas the Night Before Christmas
Life handed me a whole heck of a lot of wonderful gifts this past year. Honestly, I don’t need to find a single thing with my name on it underneath our tree tomorrow morning. It will be a great day, for sure. But let me just get the bittersweet piece out of the way. It will come as no surprise to those who know me, or to those who have read this blog, that Christmas does find me missing my mom. For at least a few “moments” every holiday season, I experience an intense longing to have her with us for Christmas. Hearing Bing Crosby crooning White Christmas in the mall is usually what sets that particular feeling off for the season. Not unexpectedly, it happened one evening last week. Fortunately, I was able to shop the feeling away in just under an hour and just over several hundred dollars.
The other dead-mother moment usually comes on Christmas day, but generally only lasts for a few short minutes. The sad feeling will come over me all of a sudden, sometime after gifts are opened, and waffles are wolfed. I won’t wallow, but I will feel the feeling, at least until the phone rings, or one of the girls makes me laugh, or my husband does his traditional Christmas trick with the turkey and I will be distracted by needing to grab the camera. (Don’t ask.)
Honestly, other than those couple of unavoidable heart tugs, I have only gladness in my yuletide heart. As the year draws to a close, I find myself full of gratitude. This year I celebrated both my fiftieth birthday and reaching the five-year cancer free mark. I had a fabulously proud Canadian Olympics experience, and a beautiful summer at the beach. I was able to toast my father’s eightieth birthday, and visit with my baby sister for the first time in five years. I spent some quality time with my two lovely daughters on Salt Spring Island, met two nephews for the first time, and enjoyed an amazing few days playing tourist with two of our grandchildren. I got to teach my dream course and to attend my youngest daughter’s yoga classes. I had a year full of warm female friendship, and celebrated nineteen years of marriage with my dearest dude. I survived a somewhat difficult year at work, but I am ending the year happy to be employed and to have two careers on the go, both fulfilling.
Outside of the big ticket moments and blessings, there have been a lot of simple but satisfying (and then some) moments. I really have no idea how I lived without my now daily cup of creamed earl grey tea, if you haven’t tried it, you must. Another excellent reading year, more than a few good movies watched. Fresh halibut dinners all through the summer, caught and cooked by the best chef and fisherman on the island. Walking back into our crooked, little house at the end of each and every long day and knowing that there is nowhere on earth that I would rather be, than here in this time and place, with all of the lovely amazing people in my life. I refer here both to people in person and in cyber space. How did I live without Facebook, that silly place where bantering with far-away cousins and long-lost friends is such a rich part of my evening routine? Say what you will about social media, it has done wonders for my family network. We even seem less dysfunctional in cyberspace. (Well, some of us.)
Rather than risk an unscheduled tearful holiday episode, let me just close now and wish you all a very merry whatever your family calls this time of year. Absent loved ones aside, I am sure that our family holiday time will be…simply perfect. I really hope yours is too.
