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| The Angel from 1945 |
Feeling Christmas
My mother’s house is decorated top to bottom with every
ornament, every Santa, every wreath and elf and angel she owns. But it doesn't "feel" like Christmas, she says.
There are
reindeer of every size and shape, from the 1920s to modern day, from Avon
bottles to plastic Rudolph’s. I have watched her for a week frantically put
lights and themed decorations on 6 Christmas trees ranging in height from 3
feet to 6 feet, and at least 9 tabletop ones. She has worn herself ragged putting
plastic poinsettias in old bottles as vases for each step on the 12 stairs to
the second floor; hanging ornaments on trees, along doorways, or displayed in
bowls. Once you step into her home, there is no doubt she is singularly focused
on Christmas.
Yet after the last ornament was in place, and
the last proverbial stocking was hung, surrounded by empty ornament boxes, bags
of bows and wrapping paper, the house glistening from floor to rafters with red,
green, gold and silver at every turn, she says, "It doesn’t feel like
Christmas."
And therein lies the problem. As we age, Christmas
can look the same, we can use the same ornaments, the same trees, the same
recipes, but it often doesn’t feel the same as we once remembered.
Her statement made me wonder: could I put in words what
Christmas feels like? It feels like
family, it feels like snow crunching beneath your feet as you approach the door
of those you love, laden with presents and food and special holiday grog. Eggnog.
Chocolate Fudge. Homemade Christmas shaped sugar cookies with pastel colored
icing and those hard silver balls called dragees we all ate despite the lead
warnings. Christmas feels like fellowship and laughter and the sound of people
stomping their feet on the doormat before coming through the door with snowy
boots. Christmas feels like cinnamon and cloves and oranges and coffee and
bacon. Christmas is timing the various parts of the holiday meal just right so
that everything gets to the table warm and ready for the large crowd of smiling
faces at the table, which is set with dishes used only on this one day.
All these things are in the past for my mom. At 91, her
active participation in the overall family Christmas is minimal. She no longer
hosts the family dinner, she no longer spends hours in the kitchen creating her
favorite snowball cookies, frangipanis, or banana bread. There's no popping in
town for last minute stocking stuffers, or the forgotten lime Jello for her holiday
molded salad, or for anything at all, for that matter. She no longer concerns
herself with wrapping—or even buying-- presents and arranging them under the
tree with only the big packages in the back, and the rest arranged forward by
size and color around the base. And then rearranged every time new presents are
haphazardly added, disrupting the well planned symmetry of a perfect tree.
This is what happens when you outlive your
generation’s family traditions, when people die, when family dynamics change,
when you've outlived your ability to play Santa, to care about watching It's a Wonderful
Life one more time, to enjoy the chaos of the season--to multi task and juggle
all the expectations. Without those things, do you lose the feeling of Christmas?
Does it end up feeling like just another day, the meaning lost along with the
traditions, the loved ones, and the ability to keep up with an ever-changing distraught
and torn world randomly caught on disturbing videos that go viral.
How does someone who experienced the results of the Depression,
saw the evolution from radio to color TV, experienced the emotional and
economic effects of several wars, marveled at the advance of medicine and
technology beyond their w ildest imaginings, how does someone like that manage
the meaning of Christmas today? My mom raised a family in much simpler times, when
homemade flannel pajamas, a board game, and a doll was about as elaborate as
the gifting needed to be. She had a loving husband, a large rambling farmhouse,
her garden, her daughters and the family dog. She ruled it all from her
position as wife, homemaker and mother. She made all the decisions on
decorating, gift giving and wrapping, the Christmas dinner menu, when and where
we would be on Christmas Eve.
Today, that same woman makes none of those decisions, but she
can decide where to put that Santa that came from Fishman’s back in 1952. So,
she decorates.
She decorates because she can, and while she pulls out
decorations from 20, 30—oh, who are we kidding – 50 years ago, she gets a
memory back of a certain Christmas past and perhaps a fleeting moment of how
Christmas used to feel.
And how many of us feel the same? That the holiday season is
no longer completely in our control and therefore, the feeling of Christmas has
escaped us. So we put up 6 Christmas trees and every Santa we ever owned. We patch the holes in our hearts --at least
for the day-- and focus on the one thing we can control. As my mom says, it may
not feel like Christmas, but I can certainly make it look like Christmas.
These days for me, Christmas is almost having a heart attack
watching my 91-year-old mom climb a stepladder to put the only angel she’s ever
used on top of the tree, and letting her do it. And later watching her fall
asleep in her chair, chin rising and falling on her chest, after a hard day of non
stop decorating. That's what Christmas has come to mean to me. And when I look
at my mom, still alive and not only thriving but also still striving for goals,
like trying to feel Christmas, I think that must be what Christmas means. Some
days it’s not pretty, some days it’s downright scary, but it is an incredible
journey and I am grateful she has given me the chance for the ride. Keep on
decorating, Mom. Christmas is right here.
