The holiday season is usually tough on me. Even when things are going good and everything is right with the world I tend to get down. I've found that this phenomenon is tied to my family. Not because the Christmases I spent growing up were bad. Quite the contrary. They were the best times I had growing up. Actually the ONLY good times I had growing up. There were, obviously, presents and expectations and great food. We went to see family members and had great parties. My mother smiled.
I didn't have a very healthy upbringing, emotionally speaking. Abuse, fights, anger and fear were things that were everyday realities I had to deal with. I did pretty well, considering. So unfortunately this time of year reminds me of all those times that were good. I know this last sentence might seem a little off to most people. How in the world can you feel bad about being reminded of good times? It is because I realize what I've lost. Or never really had. At this point it is hard to tell.
It wasn't always this way, but all I really want out of life is a certain stability that is usually found in the familiar. I don't neccessarily mean the things we see or experience everyday and know well, but things related to family, which we should see every day and know well. Which, I guess, makes that last sentence a little redundant. And "family" can mean parents or children or grandparents or lovers or pets or friends or...so many things that make "home" a lot more than just a place, but a state of mind, a certain brand of happiness.
Over the last several years I've lost "home" more than once, in many contexts. Sometimes by my own design and doing and other times because of the turns the world has taken around me. And every time I have set out to re-define my idea of it, desperately clinging to that feeling of comfort by which I define it. I don't really know much about what it should look like, or the things I need to have or achieve in order to get there. I've been wrong about who it is it needs to have to be where it needs to be and why it isn't what it should be when I thought I had it. But I know how it should feel. And I know how it doesn't.
This year I've spent this holiday season with my family. And while I didn't just come for that it is one of the things I was looking forward to. The last couple of years these days have been extra rough, so I allowed myself to fantasize about happy times and I imagined what these ones would be like. We would drive around, visiting relatives, hearing the same tired lines about how long it has been and how nice it is that we are all together again. And we would eat. Feasts of seasonal proportions and portions. Things we would see that we wouldn't see all year long. Neighbors would come by and sing on our doorstep until we opened the door and we let them in. We would go to church early in the morning.
Sadly, I was mistaken. Seems my family has stopped having this time together anymore. They don't visit or make big meals or sing songs on the street or put up a tree or decorate much of anything or make eggnog or...anything. These are just another couple of days now. Mundanely normal. Except with more shopping and more days off in which we do chores we didn't do all year. And TV. Lots of TV. THAT they share. Nobody is upset or angry then. Just quiet.
This has made me sad. I feel a profound sense of loss, like someone has stolen from me, something so precious. I have decided that there is no longer a reason for me to be here because of this. If there is no hope of seeing that glimpse of goodness they used to have why sit around waiting for something they can't even give themselves? Even if they faked it, like we used to, I couldn't enjoy it anyways. Not anymore.
And it makes me wonder, next Christmas season, when I start thinking of what these days used to be, when I want to cry for that little boy I used to be, when the reality of life runs straight into the brick wall of memory and splits my lip with a smile...will I be sad? Will the memories I have be of those years long ago when things were better? Will I wish I was around my family, just so we could pretend that we were a normal, good bunch, drinking from the same bottle of happiness we denied ourselves all year long? Or will I be happy because I no longer have to worry about what I gave up, since it doesn't exist anymore? Will I be glad to be away from them? Will I be a little more at ease knowing that I needn't worry because, in fact, there is no Santa Claus.
I hope not. I hope I can still cry at the knowledge that my upbringing was hell. I'll wish that the ghost of a dozen Christmas' past would haunt me again, making me miss those people that only existed 3 weeks a year. I'll pray for the anxiety of loneliness, the tension of family that can't be, the pressure of expectations that were never, and quite possibly never will, be met. And then I'll try to make a home out of it. I'll find new players for those old roles. There will be a new family. And we'll sing songs in the street and we'll eat foods we won't see all year long. We'll visit people and places and we'll know it is good.
Because we'll know we are family.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fCNvZqpa-7Q
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