The Christmas Ache

Christmas. For many it is a joyful day filled with family and good food, for others it is a struggle to get through the day. 

Yesterday was my final Christmas waking up in an empty house. I don't want to do it again. The 50 plus years of waking up super early to either sneak to the tree and open my stocking or hear my kids do the same has made the silence of Christmas morning unbearable. The last four years, I have been waking up to an empty house. I had invites this year from every member of my family. I declined them for a variety of reasons, which do not matter in this piece of writing. What matters is today I talked to people who also struggled through Christmas day. 

When alone, one can get caught up in one's feelings and think they are the only one going through whatever it is. In this case, being alone on Christmas. The ache inside begins. The tears flow. It doesn't help that the Hallmark channel is playing the formulaic Christmas movies. You know the one. It takes place in a Christmas town somewhere with snow involved. The woman lives in the town running an inn, Christmas shop, or in charge of the Christmas parade. Man comes to town and is not ready to recognize her for the love of his life which she is sure to become by the end of the movie. Families are together dressed in their Christmas sweaters and drinking hot chocolate. Everyone is smiling and happy. 

Yet in homes to those close to my heart, including my own, a different movie was playing. When I first woke up, I listened for the sound of my children opening their stockings. Silence. A couple of states over, a friend went through the motions knowing his mother would not be cooking their traditional Christmas dinner ever again. There would be no more buying the perfect present for her. Back in Raleigh, a woman my son's age found out her father has Stage 3 colon cancer and isn't expected to be alive for Christmas 2018. Her parents are from Romania. They celebrate Christmas on the old calendar. American Christmas is spent at her house around a tree she is proud to share with them. Only this year, she was robbed two days before Christmas. Not only was her house ransacked, her tree was taken. In Maine, the roads were impassable. Grandparents and grandchildren stayed safely cocooned at home. Presents left under the tree wrapped. The ache growing inside.

Similar stories are told all over. Military spouses hoping for a phone call from their loved one. Divorced parents waiting anxiously for it to be their turn to celebrate Christmas. The many who have lost homes this year due to hurricanes and wildfires. The homeless who may find some holiday spirit in the shelter. In a random home, where one has nowhere to go. We can find people sharing the ache in hospitals, on the battlefield, in prisons, at work, and many other places.

I wish I had been able to get out of my feelings and think clearly at around 3pm when my ache began in earnest. Had I just taken a minute to think about other people instead of shedding tears, I would have reached out. There were so many ways I could have made my day better, and in turn someone else's. We are quick to buy toys for the Angel Tree and donate food before the big day. How many of us take a few minutes to make a phone call to a loved one we know is spending the day alone? Go to the local police station with a plate filled with Christmas dinner? Spend some time in a nursing home showing our elders that they are loved? 

It is not too late to end 2017 by letting someone know they are loved. To who will you reach out?