I'm listening to the slowing sounds of my quieting house, thinking of all the things that happened in this room today, and I realize...I had a really great Christmas.
********
From the age of seven, Christmas for me predominately became about travel. We lived 6 hours from my closest grandparents, even further from the others, so to keep with tradition and spend our holidays with the family, we had to drive. And to be able to spend all day with everyone, we couldn't travel on the day of, it had to be earlier. Christmas at home became a foreign idea.
When it wasn't predominately about travel, and we happened to be home on that day "children call their favorite time of year," that meant we didn't have enough money to make the trip. If we didn't have enough money for the trip, that meant we barely had enough money to eat. Our "feast" was small. Presents were few, if there were any to be found, and often times decorations were even hard to come by. As you may imagine, Christmas atmosphere was always lacking in these times.
Growing up with this as the reality, I felt uncomfortable, not because I cared so much about the traditional "Christmas experience" (although I would be lying if I claimed it wasn't a challenge), but because it created a chasm between me and my peers. Returning to school after Christmas break, everyone wanted to talk about their experiences, and all the gifts they received from loved ones. These conversations weren't so tough at first. The only difference in what I had to share was the conspicuous lack of any time at home, and the feelings of anxiously lying in my own bed awaiting the excitement of the coming morning, and waking up in my own bed ready to embrace all the day had to give. I felt similar feelings, but in a springy hide-a-bed at Grandma and Grandpa's house. Still exciting. But different.
Then came the first year my parents didn't buy me anything. The first day back at school went something like this:
"Hey, Emily! Did you have a good Christmas?"
"Yeah, I did. How about you?"
"Yeah, mine was great. I got...*excited rambling for at least a minute, perhaps longer if their haul was particularly spectacular*. What about you?"
"...*awkward silence*...Well, my parents didn't really buy me anything this year."
"What?"
"I didn't get any presents from my parents."
"Wow."
"Yeah."
Conversation over. And if the subject wasn't graciously changed, I would be treated to stares. As someone who tried hard to blend into the background, this was hardly better than even the most awkward of conversations. I wasn't embarrassed. I harbored no ill feelings toward my parents. I was just uncomfortable with people noticing me. Just knowing they were thinking of me was almost more than I could handle. (And this, friends, is why God let me be home schooled from the age of 12. After I got to live outside of that anxiety for a good long while, I got over it. Immersion therapy works in certain circumstances; this wasn't one of them.)
Along with financial constraints, as my siblings and I got older, my parents felt less pressure to create the "Christmas experience" for us, so there was yet another reason to not force the buying of presents. And in the middle of our constant moving, most of our Christmassy possessions got broken or misplaced, or had no room to be displayed between all the moving boxes. (For a time, we always moved in the winter. Always.) Replacing them was slow to happen, and since we were barely home anyway, it was easy to let Christmassy traditions slide without much comment, because it seemed like too much effort to get an empty house ready for Christmas.
Starting in high school, Christmas for me slowly started becoming more about apathy.
All the while, Christmas in the surrounding culture was becoming bigger, and bigger, and bigger. (Irony rules my life. I'm going to write a book about it someday.)
Thanks to commercialism, the Christmas season snuck up when I wasn't looking this year. All around me were suddenly people putting up trees and lights, and filling up their social calenders, and I wasn't feeling any of it. Filled with the weight of my experience and my reluctance to jump on the bandwagon this year, I started bracing myself for new levels of apathy, and the personal mourning I knew would come after that apathy.
But what I was blind to at the time was that through all the years of stripping me of the things of Christmas, God was working to renew my heart and baptize my mind, and help me to truly cherish Christmas in a way I couldn't have otherwise.
Miraculously, this year we got to stay home, and not because we couldn't afford to see our family. We will see our family, this coming weekend. Christmas is rather inconveniently in the middle of the week, and the two of our number that have "real jobs" couldn't get off work all those extra week days around it. As neither depression nor rush were plaguing our days leading up to Christmas, I started to feel the Christmas Spirit at the beginning of the week. I was pleasantly surprised.
Then I looked around me and saw no tree. No lights. It was too hot for snow. And I remembered it had been so long since I got a present that I had no reason to expect one. And really, when I thought about it, I didn't even want one.
Then I realized all those things didn't change my mood at all.
And then I got really excited.
When you catch the Christmas Spirit it's infectious, and will only grow until its course has been run.
And so today, at home with my parents and little brothers, fed by music and sumptuous food, was a marvelous day.
But it looked almost nothing like Christmases of my earliest memories.
At this point, I am so far removed from North America's traditional "Christmas experience" that I don't even know what that means anymore, or how most people celebrate Christmas. What I do know is it's still my favorite holiday, but for completely different reasons. And it feels more honest than ever.
I don't want to change a thing.
"Then let us all with one accord
Sing praises to our heavenly Lord
That hath made heaven and earth of nought
And with his blood mankind has bought"
********
From the age of seven, Christmas for me predominately became about travel. We lived 6 hours from my closest grandparents, even further from the others, so to keep with tradition and spend our holidays with the family, we had to drive. And to be able to spend all day with everyone, we couldn't travel on the day of, it had to be earlier. Christmas at home became a foreign idea.
When it wasn't predominately about travel, and we happened to be home on that day "children call their favorite time of year," that meant we didn't have enough money to make the trip. If we didn't have enough money for the trip, that meant we barely had enough money to eat. Our "feast" was small. Presents were few, if there were any to be found, and often times decorations were even hard to come by. As you may imagine, Christmas atmosphere was always lacking in these times.
Growing up with this as the reality, I felt uncomfortable, not because I cared so much about the traditional "Christmas experience" (although I would be lying if I claimed it wasn't a challenge), but because it created a chasm between me and my peers. Returning to school after Christmas break, everyone wanted to talk about their experiences, and all the gifts they received from loved ones. These conversations weren't so tough at first. The only difference in what I had to share was the conspicuous lack of any time at home, and the feelings of anxiously lying in my own bed awaiting the excitement of the coming morning, and waking up in my own bed ready to embrace all the day had to give. I felt similar feelings, but in a springy hide-a-bed at Grandma and Grandpa's house. Still exciting. But different.
Then came the first year my parents didn't buy me anything. The first day back at school went something like this:
"Hey, Emily! Did you have a good Christmas?"
"Yeah, I did. How about you?"
"Yeah, mine was great. I got...*excited rambling for at least a minute, perhaps longer if their haul was particularly spectacular*. What about you?"
"...*awkward silence*...Well, my parents didn't really buy me anything this year."
"What?"
"I didn't get any presents from my parents."
"Wow."
"Yeah."
Conversation over. And if the subject wasn't graciously changed, I would be treated to stares. As someone who tried hard to blend into the background, this was hardly better than even the most awkward of conversations. I wasn't embarrassed. I harbored no ill feelings toward my parents. I was just uncomfortable with people noticing me. Just knowing they were thinking of me was almost more than I could handle. (And this, friends, is why God let me be home schooled from the age of 12. After I got to live outside of that anxiety for a good long while, I got over it. Immersion therapy works in certain circumstances; this wasn't one of them.)
Along with financial constraints, as my siblings and I got older, my parents felt less pressure to create the "Christmas experience" for us, so there was yet another reason to not force the buying of presents. And in the middle of our constant moving, most of our Christmassy possessions got broken or misplaced, or had no room to be displayed between all the moving boxes. (For a time, we always moved in the winter. Always.) Replacing them was slow to happen, and since we were barely home anyway, it was easy to let Christmassy traditions slide without much comment, because it seemed like too much effort to get an empty house ready for Christmas.
Starting in high school, Christmas for me slowly started becoming more about apathy.
All the while, Christmas in the surrounding culture was becoming bigger, and bigger, and bigger. (Irony rules my life. I'm going to write a book about it someday.)
Thanks to commercialism, the Christmas season snuck up when I wasn't looking this year. All around me were suddenly people putting up trees and lights, and filling up their social calenders, and I wasn't feeling any of it. Filled with the weight of my experience and my reluctance to jump on the bandwagon this year, I started bracing myself for new levels of apathy, and the personal mourning I knew would come after that apathy.
But what I was blind to at the time was that through all the years of stripping me of the things of Christmas, God was working to renew my heart and baptize my mind, and help me to truly cherish Christmas in a way I couldn't have otherwise.
Miraculously, this year we got to stay home, and not because we couldn't afford to see our family. We will see our family, this coming weekend. Christmas is rather inconveniently in the middle of the week, and the two of our number that have "real jobs" couldn't get off work all those extra week days around it. As neither depression nor rush were plaguing our days leading up to Christmas, I started to feel the Christmas Spirit at the beginning of the week. I was pleasantly surprised.
Then I looked around me and saw no tree. No lights. It was too hot for snow. And I remembered it had been so long since I got a present that I had no reason to expect one. And really, when I thought about it, I didn't even want one.
Then I realized all those things didn't change my mood at all.
And then I got really excited.
When you catch the Christmas Spirit it's infectious, and will only grow until its course has been run.
And so today, at home with my parents and little brothers, fed by music and sumptuous food, was a marvelous day.
But it looked almost nothing like Christmases of my earliest memories.
At this point, I am so far removed from North America's traditional "Christmas experience" that I don't even know what that means anymore, or how most people celebrate Christmas. What I do know is it's still my favorite holiday, but for completely different reasons. And it feels more honest than ever.
I don't want to change a thing.
"Then let us all with one accord
Sing praises to our heavenly Lord
That hath made heaven and earth of nought
And with his blood mankind has bought"
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I like conversation. Your comments promote conversation. You know what to do. Vielen Dank.