Fun-Shopping.
If I had to sum up my relationship with The™ Holidays*, I’d probably say “it’s complicated.”
It would be true to say that Christmases growing up weren’t exactly the stuff that sugarplum dreams are made of. Being the kid of a single mother pastor was hard, especially around the holidays when weeks of Advent prep led to a marathon of Christmas Eve and Christmas Day services that left Mom overly exhausted.
It would also be true to say that the Grinch who stole Christmas was me on more than one occasion. It started in my teenage years with antics that still make me cringe but it carried on well into my twenties when I scrooged my way through The Holidays volunteering to work or housesit for friends or do just about anything that would keep me home alone (usually with a bottle of wine).
I wish I could say The Holidays magically got better when I stopped drinking but that would be a lie. The first few were rough. The year that sobriety stuck was the same year that I flew from Minneapolis to Olympia a tender 15 days sober after a months-long relapse that eventually brought me to my knees. I was finally in recovery but a long way from healed and I couldn’t quite handle… well, much of anything. So on Christmas Eve, I ran. While my family ate a lovely dinner together, I drank coffee with strangers before heading to Denny’s alone for an omelette and finding one of the last rooms at an AmericInn. I’d probably still be haunted by the ghost of that Christmas if it hadn’t also been the year that grace managed to find me no matter how hard I tried hiding.
It’s gotten better since then. I don’t dread The Holidays quite as much as I used to but I can’t say that I’ve managed to get terribly excited for them either. Like I said: it’s complicated.
***
Living overseas and being married to a man who thinks that his loved ones look the same on January 27th as on any allegedly “special” day has worked well for me. His low-key attitude towards The Holidays pairs nicely with my paradoxical desires to both make them special and avoid them at the same time.
Our first year married and living in Brussels, we took off to Canterbury for a last-minute other side of the road trip. And neither of us can remember what we did last year, if anything. (I was almost uncomfortably pregnant by then so I’m sure it involved at least one nap on the couch.)
***
And this year?
Would it be wrong of me to admit that I feel a certain sense of relief that Belgium continues to stay pretty locked down?
Non-essential stores were allowed to open today but absolutely no “fun-shopping” is allowed — one must shop alone and attend to their business quickly. Museums and swimming pools were also allowed to open back up under strict protocols but pretty much everything else stays exactly as it’s been for a while now. Families are allowed 1 close contact and individuals 2. There will be no holiday gatherings this year. At least not here.
***
That sense of relief that I feel isn’t just because we will, in theory, be keeping ourselves safer from the Grinch that is COVID.
It’s that — even though I’ve healed and grown and am still healing and still growing — The Holidays aren’t totally magical for me yet.
It’s that — in a year when I’m “supposed” to be making a big hoopla because it’s Nicolas’s first Christmas — I don’t really have a way to. There’s no Santa’s lap to subject him to, no invites going out, no fancy meals to cook…
It’s that — in a year when we were given so much and still have plenty — there are so many more out there now who worry about having enough.
It’s that it’s 2020 and I’m exhausted in a way that I haven’t been in a very, very long time.
So we’re being forced to keep things low-key These Holidays? To me, it’s perfect.
***
*I am, of course, speaking of the frenzied weeks following Thanksgiving leading to the crescendo of Christmas before the finale of New Year’s. Apologies, Dear Reader, for being lazily stereotypical.
