For the last several years, I have had the honor of participating in an amazing December art project called The Advent Project. Here is the piece I wrote for the 2024 project.
Vignettes
I. (2007)
He asked that the lights be blue.
He loved blue lights.
He knew he wouldn't make it to Christmas, so he wanted Christmas to be brought to him.
He loved Christmas.
They kept the tree up year round. It wasn't a normal tree--it was an upside-down tree with the fuller branches at the top and a bare trunk. Better this way with all the cats.
My brother and I got out the decorations. The basement closet was full of them. We hung the blue lights and special ornaments and moved the hospital bed to face the living room so he could see the tree. We played carols and wore Santa hats and watched movies he wanted to see or see one last time.
That Thanksgiving was our Christmas, and our last one all together.
The blue lights continued to twinkle through the tears we blinked away--light reflecting on water droplets of grief and love and loss.
II. (2016)
She shipped the boxes to my brother's house.
She was only able to express her love through gifts. She was looking forward to giving them.
She loved Christmas.
There was much to celebrate that year: new family members, big milestones, and other joys of life.
I flew to her home to be her companion for travel. She wasn't ready to go. She needed to lie down just for a moment. And again. I put her suitcase in the rental car, helped her climb in, and drove us back to where I had started.
It was a tumultuous flight. There was a bottle missing. She needed it. She disappeared into herself.
The suitcase was empty. Next came withdrawals, hospitals, the rationing and hiding of pills.
Whispers in the dining room--"What do we do?"
Christmas day--she was there; she wasn't there. She said to just open the shipping boxes and pick what we wanted. She cried and begged and cried.
What do we do?
What do we do?
We stared at the colorful lights on the tree in frozen fear of what was to come.
III. (2024)
She hasn't put up a tree in years. It's too hard.
She cries when she hears or tries to sing carols--it's too overwhelming.
She used to love Christmas.
She wants to enjoy the season again.
She understands the importance of healing the wounds. It's hard and exhausting work, but she is starting to feel that she is worth the effort.
She wants to find joy in singing again. She joins a choir. The harmonic notes she sings gives her something to focus on besides the painful memories.
She puts up a tree. She laughs at the memories the ornaments bring--the irreverent ones she collects with her husband and the ones from the joyful Christmases of her youth--back when she had parents. She feels gratitude for her life and family, both chosen and by blood. She embraces the grief and the darkness of the season, for she knows that life needs these moments. You cannot have light without the dark.
She now knows that she can visit the pain, but she no longer has to live there.
She wraps herself up in a blanket, smooches the cats, and smiles at the blue lights twinkling on the tree.
She loves Christmas.
