Did you know it’s technically still Christmas? If you are Christian (maybe, specifically Catholic), you probably did. In fact, Christmas Day is just the beginning of Christmas. Those 12 days we sing about with the partridge in a pear tree? It’s a real thing.
I knew this and also didn’t know this because it wasn’t until this Christmas that I set out to experience it as something more than something to just get through. So when the small, free book I picked up at St. Mary’s called Daily Reflections for Advent & Christmas, by Susan H. Swetnam, didn’t end Dec. 25, I thought, oh that’s right. There’s more.
Advent – from the Latin adventus – is about waiting, anticipation, the arrival, the coming of Jesus.
But as every new parent knows, birth is just the beginning. It’s everything that comes after that’s the journey. After the baby showers (and these days, the gender reveal party), and the big bang of being born, you’re left to figure out how to live with what you brought into the world.
Or, in the case of the consumer-focused holiday we celebrate on Dec. 25, how to incorporate your new oven mitt, nautical chart, Duke Cannon Man soap supply, and flannel sheets into the flow of daily life, announcing not only the thoughtfulness of the item, but your appreciation of it.
Social media memes point out that the time between Christmas and New Year’s is a special somewhat unmoored time out of time when you’re not sure what day it is or even what hour. You might wear the same pajamas … forever.
Judging by the handful of hanging-out-at-home clothes I just put in the wash, I made it through this week with commendably few wardrobe changes. Our meal plan was leftovers. When we ate through those, we scavenged the stockings for hard candy. Girl dinner became dark chocolate sea salted caramel snowmen, a handful of German candied nuts, and the last of the charcuterie d’affinois (a buttery, melt-in-your-mouth, soft French cheese).
It is as it is (sort of) supposed to be.
Maybe we don’t celebrate the feast of St. Stephen (Dec. 26, or as some call it, Boxing Day), or the Day of Holy Innocents (Dec. 28), or the Fifth Day within the Octave of the Nativity of the Lord (Dec. 29). I know all of this because of my little Advent book.
But this time is meant to be not like other time. Social media doesn’t always get it totally wrong.
The little Advent book says Dec. 27 is St. John the Apostle’s Day. But this day is significant to me for other reasons because my mom died on it. I may not have known all the saints and feast days until this year, but this day is as much an annual observance for me as any holiday. Just darker. Much much darker.
I set out to have a specific experience this Advent season. I wanted to actually show up for the grief that comes with every Christmas like the nonsensical, stupid, not-funny joke gift that nobody should get stuck with at the Yankee Swap.
This year, I wanted to turn around and look this unwelcome Ghost of Christmas Past in the face as it sidled along beside my shopping cart that I filled with stuff meant to blot out it’s rude intrusion on what’s supposed to be the most wonderful time of the year.
Instead of waving this mean spirit away with a broomstick in my hand and sweeping the broken pieces of my heart into a corner with the red-and-white jimmie sprinkles and crushed candy canes, I wanted to kneel inside my sorrow and hold each shard in my hand.
I would not toss a holiday-checked tablecloth over the ghost (even as it played musical chairs with my memories). There would be no over-baking, over-decorating, over-giving (over-spending), over-eating … Anything I typically overdid (with all the bells on and tangled in bows), I would not overdo this year because it was so totally and completely overdone.
My grief, on the other hand, was overdue.
My kids were little when my mother died 18 years ago. My youngest was not even a year old. It’s easy to leave sadness packed away, an ornament too precious to hang, when the holiday decor is more about soft items little hands would not break. My grief was safely kept in a box padded and molded in the shape of my heart where it would not shatter …. I mean, actually, where it would not shatter me.
I dug it out of the attic shadows this year and brushed the dust off the lid.
My sorrow shines just like it did when I put it away, catches the light just right, sparkling like snow in headlights.
It’s kind of like Christmas, you know? It keeps it’s promise.
Raye S. Leonard 