What is it about Christmas music, lights, a tree, old holiday movies or animated classics, snow and who knows what other triggers create the spirit of the season? I know I feel completely transformed during the Christmas season – I enjoy listening to music while baking and cooking, the lights on the house and inside give me an inside glow and feeling of comfort, and I’m generally more easygoing and at peace.
The holidays always make me reflect on my earliest Christmases spent with grandparents in Wisconsin and their silver tree, our early Christmases in Arizona and putting the tinsel on the tree ONE STRAND AT A TIME (thanks, Dad!) and later Christmases when I lived in Germany and was so lucky to go to the outdoor Christmas markets that felt like a living fairy tale, or Christmases in my first house where I really enjoyed decorating to the nines!
There is something almost magical about Christmas for me. It’s not a want of things, God knows I have too many things. Rather it’s a feeling of peace and goodwill that seems to have been missing this year, whether that’s due to the global pandemic and everyone’s nerves being shot, or the political drama that’s played out over the last 4 years and continues to play out. But as soon as it’s getting close to Christmas I put on my Christmas playlist and everything feels right again in my world.
Sadly my husband isn’t very excited about Christmas. He says he doesn’t know why, but he certainly doesn’t share my sentiments about the holidays. Fortunately he still helps me hang lights, my giant, blow molded Santa head that lights up, and helps to haul things from the garage to the house so that I can decorate. He’s more interested in putting a water pump in my old truck than hearing stories about the ornaments I bought in Germany, or how my dad made us put tinsel on one strand at a time, but he humors me and feigns interest, and that’s OK.
My father passed away in early December of 2007. That was the year I stopped sending Christmas cards, and I’ve never gotten back to sending them. (I used to send out about 90 cards with hand written notes each year) My grandmother also passed away in mid-December of 2001, so December was a tough month for a while. But with time, which DOES heal all wounds, the spirit of the season restored in me a sense of possibility, love, joy, and peace each year since those huge losses.
All I can do is enjoy the season and hope that others also feel the sense of possibility, goodwill towards others, a return to kindness, and the joy that the season brings. I know I’m not really articulating what I feel very well, but I’m very thankful as I sit here the night before Thanksgiving. I’m thankful for the love and support of my husband, family and friends. I’m thankful for this new adventure I’m on, and my ability to work from home. I’m especially thankful that I took a chance with moving to Northern Michigan, and that I hung in there when it didn’t pay initially. My new motto is, “If you bake it they will come”!
I’m sure I will reread this nonsensical rambling tomorrow and recognize it’s fueled by very little sleep, a holiday that’s upon us, and the fact that my Christmas playlist has been burning up my old iPod for a week! Sending love, blessings and peace to anyone who took the time to read this mess of ideas thrown together haphazardly. Happy Thanksgiving! Andria
Red Gate Farm 