Wherewith Being Crowned
You don’t have to have turkey on Thanksgiving.
When I was a kid my mom went to a lot of trouble for the holidays. She decorated the house, filled it with festive music, and made sure we ate all the normal holiday foods with as many extended family members as we could round up. The perfect holidays.
And, as with all families, they also weren’t the perfect holidays. We had our share of not-getting-along, which is a concise way to sum up the long, interesting, sometimes dramatic stories that inevitably arise from attempts to capture a holiday season ideal. Literally everyone has them.
When I went off to college I decided to experiment with alternatives to the holiday ideal. I would have Anti-Holidays in which I chose activities that almost no one would consider traditional.
I called all family members and told friends that presents were a thing of the past. Don’t get me anything, I won’t get you anything. Everyone responded as if it was the biggest present I could ever give them. A wholehearted yes yes yes was the reply.
Over the years we had adventures. Or we didn’t.
We went to Graceland for Thanksgiving. We ate Chinese food for Christmas dinner. We went to New Orleans for the holidays. We did nothing but watch all three Lord of the Rings movies (which I don’t recommend because it adds up to hours of battle scenes.) My favorite is snow skiing from 8 am til 4 pm Christmas day.
Sometimes we’d have friends-givings, sometimes lots of family, sometimes just us. Some years we’d opt for a real tree and a big meal and go traditional the whole way, but only if we wanted to.
Last year Scott and spent Thanksgiving day driving to Charleston, SC. That evening we ate our already prepared cranberries and pumpkin pie (and such) on paper plates in a hotel room. The weekend was fantastic.
This year I’m going to take care of a sick friend while Scott goes to see his family in Ohio.
The decision is never made based on what we were supposed to do, but what we want to do. Our only expectations are that we might have fun or do some good, and that we don’t have anything to fight about. We make our plans around that.
When you’re at Graceland on a holiday or on the ski slopes, you’re with other Anti-Holiday fans. Everyone wishes each other well, and we all sense the family-like connection of being with people on the holidays, even if they’re just strangers waving at you.
Each year, near Thanksgiving or even earlier, people ask, are you ready for the holidays? I answer yes, I am completely ready, even when I have bought no presents, have no meals planned, have not decorated the house, and have no idea what we’re doing.
To me, being ready means that I am mentally prepared to follow my inclinations and intuition and invitations wherever they lead this season. I love the traditional music and decorations and food, and I may partake in it. But the real celebration is about embracing the loving intentions of the season, but with no expectations that what I do will actually bring that about.
Yes, my choices are geared toward fostering gratitude, love, and joy, but it might just be an ordinary day, or even an iffy one. If I embrace myself and loved ones as unpredictable humans with moods and mishaps, I’m actually loving, not Norman Rockwell loving.
I’ll end with my favorite Christmas memory. The year before the pandemic, on Christmas Eve, I was volunteering at our local homeless shelter, spending the night. A 20-year-old girl asked me to watch her baby while she showered and did her laundry. Their story was a tragic one, like that of everyone there.
I had a little room away from the main dorm, and I held Ava, her baby, and started to sing a Christmas carole. Ava looked at me like she’d never heard music come out of someone’s mouth, like it was the most magical thing that could happen. I sang carole after carole and swayed while she stared wide-eyed at me. Eventually she put her head on my shoulder. Sometimes she’d hum a little.
When I thought she’d fallen asleep I stopped. Ava’s head popped up in a panic and she looked at me, wordlessly saying, you better not quit. I started up again and she laid her head back down. I sang and swayed for an hour and half, until her mom came back.
I thought of all the experiences that Ava would have in her life, and wondered whether this one would make an impact. I hoped it would. I know she made an impact on me, in that place of desperation. In one of the farthest situations from a traditional holiday one can get, I celebrated the heart of holiday purpose more than in all my many years.
I hope you give this season a chance unfold in it’s own way. Traditional intentions are fantastic, but let them serve your serenity and joy, not take it away. Do one thing out of the ordinary and see how it makes you feel. I’d love to hear about it.
