I will readily admit, I've been a bit of a jackass about Christmas this year. I didn't decorate anything, I bought all of my presents online so I wouldn't have to deal with any of the people in stores, and I've decided not to send Christmas cards. It's December 19, and I haven't wrapped anything. This is why I need people, like chefs and maids and personal valets.
Then I realized, this is the first Christmas without my dad, and I hate it. He's the one that first made me love the original "Grinch," and he actually sang the song. He used to put bells outside our windows to let us know Santa had been there. When we got a basketball goal, he wrote a letter from Santa, attached it to the basketball inside, with instructions of where to go to find the basketball goal. He put together trampolines, laid out Barbie bolls, and wrote letters from Santa next to eaten cookies.
When we opened gifts, he would sit on the hearth in a Mississippi State sweatshirt I bought him, drinking in the fact that all of his "chicks" were at home. All he wanted was to sit and enjoy family time, eating, and watching his favorite movies (George C. Scott's "A Christmas Carol"). I don't think I was prepared for how badly I would miss him this Christmas. For the past 4 years, I've bought him Mississippi State gear, and he was wearing the last hat I gave him when he died.
I really swear I'm not trying to depress anyone, I'm okay. I'm just having trouble dealing with change, and I'm typing through tears right now, but I spent the best day with Smitty today. I am so lucky to have someone like him to understand my crazy mood swings and know before I do that I miss my father and need to cry sometimes, and sometimes I need to have wine and sushi and talk about monkeys or the children's book I want to write about the farm where the animals wear pants..(oh, it's happening)
And as a result of my very pleasant day with my husband, I've begun to feel the vague sensation of what could be classified as Christmas spirit. I've felt very content today and at peace, and I have to think that my dad is probably pissed that I'm not feeling very elf-ish yet, and he sent me some heavenly pixie dust or whatever. I've had this sensation for weeks that he's with me, in the form of random Shakespeare quotes popping up, movies that he and I have specifically discussed being on TV, too many instances of coincidences that really aren't coincidences.
To the friends that I know that have lost parents in recent years, and the ones that I don't know, we're in this thing together. Thank God for our memories that sustain us during this time. And we are making new ones. They're just as good, they're just different.
“It's surprising how much of memory is built around things unnoticed at the time” -- Barbara Kingsolver
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