In our
house, we celebrate Christmas. (Both the
Santa part and the Jesus part.) It is
our favorite time of the year. For the
kids, there is an element of predictability in our celebrating that’s
comforting as well as the promise of parties, sweets and, best of all,
presents. For us, there are the warm
fuzzy memories of past Christmases with loved ones, recreating aspects of our
own youth and creating new traditions of our own.
As with any religious holiday, we
have certain things that we do the same way every year. Sometimes we follow a ritual scripted by our
religious beliefs. For example, Jesus
isn’t part of our nativity scene until Christmas morning. He sleeps in my grandmother’s teacup until
he’s born. (One year, the Wise men
started out across the room and journeyed slowly to the scene. That was my daughter’s idea and too much work
for me!) We also keep our tree up until
“Little Christmas”- January 6th- the day the Wise Men finally
reached Jesus. We read the Christmas
story and try to remember that that is why we give and get presents- to
celebrate Jesus’ birthday.
Beyond the religious observance,
there are certain moments that are Christmas to me. Memories spring up that I then HAVE to
recount to my kids. In fact, the telling
becomes it’s own tradition. As we look
for our tree, I remember trudging through the little Christmas tree business
that sprang up on an empty lot near our house.
It was always so exciting to go but then frustrating because my mom
wanted to find the perfect tree. I just
wanted to get it home and up. I loved
listening to Christmas records and being together while we unwrapped and
remembered each ornaments “story”. (I
still love this part.) This meant Christmas really was coming and felt like our
own party.
It seemed to take forever for my
mother to get the perfect tree. An
eternity of trudging up and down aisles and getting covered with sap as we
asked, “How about this one?” To be fair to my mother, the entire thing could’ve
only taken minutes. Or maybe it seemed
so long because the experience was a carbon copy from year to year and they all
added up to one long memory? I’m not
picky on our tree hunt and think that every tree is beautiful once our things
are on it but I wonder how my kids would tell it? Maybe later they will complain about our
crooked misshapen trees?
When we get the tree home and into
the stand, there are always the adjustment arguments. My husband lies under the tree while we shout
“More to the left. No, the other left!”
That moment is like a time machine to me. Suddenly I am back in my brown-paneled
childhood living room watching my father lie under our tree: My mother is trying to tell my father which
way to adjust it and somehow it’s like they are speaking different
languages. Her instructions don’t match
what he does and he always ends up pissed off and cursing!
While she would hate me telling this and
would never understand it, this is one of my favorite Christmas memories! There’s
something just so funny about it. It was
so Un-Christmasy and yet so them. The
nostalgia makes me want to goad my husband until the expletives fly so I can
feel all warm and fuzzy! But I resist…
There is another memory that is not
so very Christmasy though it starts out
that way… When you’re Italian, Christmas
Eve is the big night. A big fish dinner
and boisterous relatives. When I was
little, our Italian wing of the family was smaller so our dinners were low
key. Just my Grandpa and aunt came
over. And I don’t know if there was
fish. There must’ve been but, as a
child, I was extremely picky- I may have removed the fish from my mental
tableau.
When I was 10, my grandpa
died. The following Christmas going to
the cemetery was added to the Christmas Eve schedule. In my memory, my aunt would come over early
in the day to bring my brother and me to the cemetery. (Really, this could’ve been anytime in the
Christmas season but I remember it as Christmas Eve. Maybe that’s when my parents did their final
prep? Any way…) We would stop, buy two
Christmas pine grave blankets and proceed to my grandparent’s section of the
giant cemetery.
After our visit there, we would go
to another section where my grandmother’s family was interred. While we stood over the grave, my aunt would tell
us about how these relatives were never as nice to my aunt and her siblings as
they were to the other side of the family.
She would remember aloud some of the spitefulness she remembered. As a child, I felt righteous anger for
her. And I also felt a bit of, “Ha! And look who visits you? Are those rotten other children here?
No!” Making up my own narrative of
wickedness to fill in the blanks.
Feeling sorry for my younger-imagined, poor, slighted branch of the
family.
I didn’t really think about that as
being a tradition but I guess it did become stitched into my Christmases. Years and years later, after my own mother
died, I took my little daughter to the cemetery before Christmas to do the
grave blanket thing. And I decided to
make the drive to my grandparent’s cemetery to visit them as well. At the florist, I purchased a grave blanket
and impulsively threw in a smaller decoration.
We visited my grandpa and I told my daughter wonderful stories about
him. When leaving, we drove around the
cemetery a bit until I found something familiar looking. After some searching on foot. I found my great-relatives. I gave them the smaller decoration
(spitefully?) and then proceeded to tell my daughter how mean they were to my
family! I realized how funny the whole
thing was and couldn’t wait to get home and call my aunt in Florida. “You’d be proud! I visited them BUT made sure
to tell of their meanness! And only left a tiny decoration!” It was crazy!
So if there is a lesson in this, I
guess it would be that you never know which memories will stick. We all try so hard to make the holidays
perfect for our families. We try to make
new and special memories for them to treasure and always remember. BUT, sometimes those aren’t the memories that
stick! I do have other wonderful
memories of the holidays from when I was young.
One year we made popcorn strings for the birds. One year I got to play Mary in a church
nativity scene. But those memories are more shadowy. The things that unintentionally
happened every year? Those are the ones
that really stuck.
So while we parents try to package
up beautiful, childhood memories for our children to take on their life
journey’s, be prepared for the hitchhikers.
Years from now, we’ll be remembering our beautiful version of Christmas
and our children will swear it never happened.
They will only remember (once!) that the raccoons got into the
cannolis. (Who left the garage open?) Or they’ll remember their dad and me sparring
over Christmas Eve feast preparations.
Or the year someone little threw up.
But I guess that’s ok. I treasure
my weird memories and they will too…
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