This statement is sadly true. I wish it wasn't. I'm not sure what to do about it. My mom is gone, and that makes me furious. My family has little money and we're not really as close as many other families, and that makes me furious, too. And my dad is limited in a way that makes me feel lots of different things.
He hoards things in his bedroom. My sister thinks it's because he has very little that he has control over, so he holds on to what he has. This includes things it doesn't make sense to hoard, like shampoo and conditioner. He won't let my sister take them to the bathroom when his are empty; he makes her buy more.
On Thursday my sister went into his room and saw that he'd taken some Christmas cards from the large pile in the living room. They were lying on his bedside table, neatly stacked, each one signed with my dad's shaky left hand. Much the way swearing is a remaining reflex of speech, his signature, signed in his non-dominant hand, is a vestige of his written skills, an anomaly. Beneath them she found some money and she realized he meant to put the money in the cards as Christmas gifts - we assumed member's of my dad's extended family, but couldn't be sure. He had addressed the envelopes, but the result in each case was his own name, a skipping record repeating the last few words of a song you know by heart.
The next day he pulled my sister into his room and pantomimed the necessity for her to get change for the bills while she was in town. On Christmas Eve, he rolled his wheelchair into the living room, and I helped him put the cards in our stockings because it turned out that the cards were for us. He was confused when I couldn't figure out which envelope went in whose stocking - to him he had labeled them quite clearly.
That night as we emptied our stockings, we opened his cards and each of us got $10 with the exception of Keegan, to whom he had slipped an extra $5. He looked happy that we were happy, grateful for what he could do.
I do appreciate it. That's what Christmas is supposed to be - each of us doing what we can for each other to try to express how much we love each other and appreciate the gift that is knowing the other person. But it's a kind of bittersweet appreciation for my family. What we can do for each other isn't much, and in many ways it's a reduced version of what we've been able to do for each other in the past. Christmas feels horribly incomplete without my mom there, as though we're all still trying to figure out how to talk to each other without her acting as interpreter. We limp along as best we can, our crutch the incredibly deep love we have for each other.
If we have to be dependent upon something to make our family gatherings possible, I'm glad it's love, as that seems to be the one emotion we have for each other that resists whatever tide of dysfunction is currently rising or ebbing. This, oddly, might explain why my mother's absence is as surprising as ever - because our love for her is as present and strong as ever. It's like a thick, heavy rope pulled taut between us and her. The rope is still there, held by some unseen force where she used to be. When we're all together, the tug of her feels the strongest and it's confusing that she isn't actually there, smiling as we open gifts, hugging us with her soft cheek pressing against ours, her baby powder smell filling our noses. How could she not actually be there when her presence is felt so strongly? Death, so fundamental to life, is horribly confusing.
When I started writing this, I wasn't sure why I was so angry. Why anger of all emotions? Sadness would seem to make more sense, or perhaps longing, or loss? And what I come up with is anger - I think because my sadness tinges the happiness I feel when I'm at home, and I resent that. I want to enjoy what we have, not feel sad for what we don't have.
He hoards things in his bedroom. My sister thinks it's because he has very little that he has control over, so he holds on to what he has. This includes things it doesn't make sense to hoard, like shampoo and conditioner. He won't let my sister take them to the bathroom when his are empty; he makes her buy more.
On Thursday my sister went into his room and saw that he'd taken some Christmas cards from the large pile in the living room. They were lying on his bedside table, neatly stacked, each one signed with my dad's shaky left hand. Much the way swearing is a remaining reflex of speech, his signature, signed in his non-dominant hand, is a vestige of his written skills, an anomaly. Beneath them she found some money and she realized he meant to put the money in the cards as Christmas gifts - we assumed member's of my dad's extended family, but couldn't be sure. He had addressed the envelopes, but the result in each case was his own name, a skipping record repeating the last few words of a song you know by heart.
The next day he pulled my sister into his room and pantomimed the necessity for her to get change for the bills while she was in town. On Christmas Eve, he rolled his wheelchair into the living room, and I helped him put the cards in our stockings because it turned out that the cards were for us. He was confused when I couldn't figure out which envelope went in whose stocking - to him he had labeled them quite clearly.
That night as we emptied our stockings, we opened his cards and each of us got $10 with the exception of Keegan, to whom he had slipped an extra $5. He looked happy that we were happy, grateful for what he could do.
I do appreciate it. That's what Christmas is supposed to be - each of us doing what we can for each other to try to express how much we love each other and appreciate the gift that is knowing the other person. But it's a kind of bittersweet appreciation for my family. What we can do for each other isn't much, and in many ways it's a reduced version of what we've been able to do for each other in the past. Christmas feels horribly incomplete without my mom there, as though we're all still trying to figure out how to talk to each other without her acting as interpreter. We limp along as best we can, our crutch the incredibly deep love we have for each other.
If we have to be dependent upon something to make our family gatherings possible, I'm glad it's love, as that seems to be the one emotion we have for each other that resists whatever tide of dysfunction is currently rising or ebbing. This, oddly, might explain why my mother's absence is as surprising as ever - because our love for her is as present and strong as ever. It's like a thick, heavy rope pulled taut between us and her. The rope is still there, held by some unseen force where she used to be. When we're all together, the tug of her feels the strongest and it's confusing that she isn't actually there, smiling as we open gifts, hugging us with her soft cheek pressing against ours, her baby powder smell filling our noses. How could she not actually be there when her presence is felt so strongly? Death, so fundamental to life, is horribly confusing.
When I started writing this, I wasn't sure why I was so angry. Why anger of all emotions? Sadness would seem to make more sense, or perhaps longing, or loss? And what I come up with is anger - I think because my sadness tinges the happiness I feel when I'm at home, and I resent that. I want to enjoy what we have, not feel sad for what we don't have.
Comments
Also, I have married friends that do that. They never go visit anyone for Christmas. They just sneak away quietly for some time for just the two of them.
As for Xmas, I see Sean all the time so a couple's vacation isn't my goal. I'd love to see my other family (including you, of course) during the holidays. I just want to see you all in Montreal or Belize so we can all have fun (and not make our beds).