Going Through the Motions

I’m trying to pull the spirit of Christmas out of myself and out of the boxes scattered on the playroom floor – everything feels dusty and I am out of practice. I am resisting the season even as carols play and colorful lights dot the landscape. 

I admit the Christmas spirit within me started to fade a few years ago when the kids moved out.  It was an effort to muster excitement hanging the two remaining stockings by the chimney with care knowing the other stockings were now lined up on mantles elsewhere, but we did it.  The kids hadn’t moved far, we would see them on Christmas Day, but their bedrooms were empty on the Eve and something in the quiet space they left behind ached.  

This year I fear the whole damn spirit is lost to me. I’m not putting up a tree and I sure as hell am not pulling my single stocking out of storage.  I can hear Scrooge in my voice even as I try to feign enthusiasm for the man in the red suit. I haven’t baked a cookie or purchased a turkey and the grand dinner is less then two weeks away. My halls are marginally decked – I’m taking a minimalist approach and being more conscious about having to put it all away than I am feeling excited to put it up.  I’m just not into it.  

I knew this Christmas would be tough, that the hole in our family would overshadow the season. I knew we would have to put on brave faces and force our smiles – and not just for a day.  Christmas is a season, it’s weeks of build-up; concerts, recitals, preparation.  There are traditions to be kept, stories to revisit and this year a ghost to acknowledge.  This Christmas is more than tough – it is a burden and it weighs on my mind even as I sleep. 

I really am trying to live in the moment, trying not to spend my time looking over my shoulder and falling into Christmas past, but that’s where my ‘happy’ is. It’s back there with my little kids, it’s in the confusion and chaos, wrapped in paper, tied with bows and safely tucked in memory.  The temptation to close my eyes and drift on moments only I can see is almost overpowering.

I’ve been in a place like this before, where Christmas came and went and we did little more than go through the motions. The first Christmas after my Mom died is a blur, the first one without Dad is faint as well.  We put in those Christmases for the kids, the little ones with stars in their eyes and ears on high alert for sleigh bells in the night. But this year the emptiness feels different, this emptiness fills me and I’m finding it hard to even go through the motions.

My children are making the best of the season, pushing through their grief and making merry even if they don’t feel it. I need to do the same, it’s just hard in an empty house – the dogs don’t know if it’s Wednesday let alone Christmas. But I do. I need to pull up my socks.  This Christmas is just the first without him and I need to set a precedent. I will go through the motions, cook the damned bird and be thankful I’m here to do just that. Onward.