It’s going to be nearly 75 degrees today, Christmas Day. I’m walking in the woods that I love, looking for signs of life besides my own. I’ve stacked loads of branches, one on top of the other trying to keep the trail clean and I wonder what the squirrels, rabbits, raccoon and deer think of my project. Do they find it absurd, the cleaning of the woods? Maybe they appreciate when the snow falls and a predator is near. Maybe they are glad I keep the trail neat and tidy. There is so much beauty around me, even without the snow. I heard someone say once that they loved this world and would be so sad to leave it, even with all the strife and ugliness we sometimes endure.
Have you ever just wanted to stop time? I feel myself in the middle of a road that no matter how many times I hold my hands out, as if I can stop myself from moving, I realize that I’m further down that road. Today, I want to go home. I want to be a child again in my parents home with the cedar tree that my mother cut with an axe for Christmas, and the branches from the bottom that my father removed and then tied to the middle to fill it in. I want to pop popcorn and string it together and hang it from the branches and whisper to my younger siblings that Santa has indeed been to our house. I want sled rides and ice skates situated at the bottom of my grandparents stairs waiting for us to put our too small of feet in them, but doing it anyway because who can resist the skating pond?
I’m scared of the day my dad treats me as the adult I am, when he asks me what my analysis is of him, of his health, and I’ll know that I truly am an adult with no more pretense.
I’ve said over and over that no matter the situation there is always something right around the bend, that everything that looks terrible today could pave the way for something wonderful. It’s what keeps me moving forward. When I was 11 years old I lost my brother and my parents lost their son. We went from a family of six to a family of five and the heartbreak was unmeasurable. A year later my parents welcomed a baby boy and then two years after that, a baby girl. With that terrible loss came unexpected joy. Not a replacement but something that healed some of the pain. Life is a series of surprises. It’s the only thing I really know.
I started this morning writing down the things that I’m grateful for, lest I forget and I don’t want to forget. My mom phoned this morning while doing her usual list of holiday traditions. She was in the middle of making homemade dressing, while ticking off the things that were finished already. The rolls are done. Tick. The cranberry dressing is in the fridge. Tick. They are having two small turkeys this year but they don’t need to go in the oven quite yet. I can hear Dad in the background talking to my brother. Mom is mentioning a just thought of, but perfect place to put her beloved Christmas village and I know my father will be enlisted to help. They are moving around the too small kitchen in a familiar pattern, graceful as a dance. I envy my mother’s ability to keep all the plates in the air. The gravitational pull to their home, my home feels the same for nearly every person that has ever stepped foot in the place. It is Christmas in the canyon.
I am grateful for this life, short as it is and for all the people that have brought me to this point. May we always look forward towards tomorrow even as we pay homage to our past.