Once Upon A Christmas

On our first Christmas together as a married couple, I was working at a bank and Mark was a grad student. The bank was open on Christmas Eve until noon and I had to work. Mark decided to go into the lab for a few hours, and the plan was to meet back at our apartment, get our stuff, and drive the two-and-a-half hours to Chicago. We woke up to snow, and as the morning progressed the weather got worse. By 11:00 the interstate was closed due to blowing, drifting, and ice covered roads and there went our opportunity to get home to family. Because we had been planning on leaving town, there was little food in the fridge. On Christmas Day, we ate minute steaks and canned green beans on tv trays while sitting in lawn chairs (our furniture at the time), drinking the last two beers in the fridge, and watching MTV. I was either crying or napping from crying until Mark declared we were leaving the house and going to the movies. We saw Terms of Endearment.

Every year we would talk about that Christmas and how it was an Epic Holiday Shit Show. Terms of Endearment? What were we thinking? Mark was in love with Debra Winger and came out of the theatre so bereft over her dying he could barely talk. We drove home in silence, killed some roaches in the bathroom like we did every night before we brushed our teeth, and fell into bed. “Thank god this day is over,” I said to Mark before we both fell asleep. The following day the sun was out, it reached the high 40s, and you would have never known there was a winter storm the day before.

For decades we would drive back and forth to Chicago for Christmas. When we lived in Maryland it was twelve hours each way with two kids, from here nine hours with three kids. A few years before Mark died, I said “enough” and we stayed in our own house for the entire holiday. Turns out there are no trophies for driving through treacherous weather or ending up sick and exhausted from stress. I loved it and never wanted to go back to how we used to do it. Mark came to love it, too, especially when the kids piled through the door, but for all the happiness he felt for us to be under one roof opening presents, he was a horrible gift receiver. He never asked for anything extravagant, every year it was socks, biking stuff, new pajamas. The kids would call me and plead for ideas but Mark was never enamored with stuff unless it was useful. Every year when it was his turn to open, I had an underlying feeling that he felt a little embarrassed as if he didn’t deserve any of it.

Now I have a hard time being near the men’s department of any store. Sometimes I’ll be brave (or maybe punish myself) and wander through to see what I would have bought and put under the tree if Mark were still alive. Useful things like sweaters and dress shirts for work, maybe a pair of slippers, new biking gloves, and socks, good wool socks. He, on the other hand, always went overboard with me, and as they got older I’d send one of the kids with him to keep him in check. “Don’t you dare go over our budget, Mark,” I would say to him as he left and he waved me off in that way he did when he thought I was being ridiculous.

Last year we had Mallory and her boyfriend in California on a video call as we opened our gifts from Secret Santa. Later when I talked to her, she said that they both felt spoiled with everything that was sent to them for Christmas. “Good,” I said, “that’s exactly how I wanted you to feel.” In writing this blog, I often feel spoiled with love and support. I am grateful that openly talking and writing about loss has an audience, when for so long grievers have felt forced to stuff that pain so deep down it exploded out in other ways. Writing is a quiet and solitary endeavor, so if you have shared my work, left a comment or feedback, called or texted me after reading something I’ve written, I want you to know how much that means to me. I don’t think of this as a journey of mine alone but for all of us. I just happen to have figured out how to put it into words.

My life is proof that the most unimaginable things can happen when you least expect it, and if this season hits hard, terribly hard with longing, you are not alone. Maybe if we promise to stay the course, to not give in or give up, we’ll find a clearing in the woods under the stars where all of us heartbroken can gather to dance in the joy of loving and being loved so perfectly it hurts.

Merry Christmas,
k.