Falsified Festivities
It is going to take more than a ham.
I’m looking for a time machine, preferably one that can get me to wake up on Boxing Day but then keep me in a holiday time loop where I read magic realism for two weeks straight over and over again.
I am trying to avoid Christmas, if that wasn’t clear. I would have asked for a time turner in my stocking but by then it would be too late.
Grief gingerbread sandwich
I came across an article for daughters that had lost their mothers and how to cope during the holidays. I was looking for the comfort of sweet gingerbread but instead it served me a grief sandwich. It talked about how much we may miss our moms during the holiday, how difficult it would be depending on how much their beloved moms loved Christmas.
The article allowed me a little trip down memory lane. Some are fond, others are funny ones and some had tears.
Then the article said we were now responsible to provide the Christmas magic in our mothers’ absence.
What kind of pressure is that? Why would an article for those grieving just slather on the guilt and shame like icing?
Women and magic
Why, because somewhere along the way, no matter the circumstance, women have been saddled with providing all the Christmas magic. Of course, this display of magic is in direct conflict with when women were historically hunted and burned alive if suspected of magic. Suddenly, it is expected and welcome when the hat on our heads are plush red and white vs black and pointy.
Watch any Christmas movie out there and you will see the pressures of Christmas magic attributed to women. If you ask Google why, you’ll just get a playlist recommendation for your troubles.
Stereotypically, the men or dads are getting by with just showing up with their spiked coffee, faking their way through kids opening presents like they have any clue as to what is in the box.
Typically women/moms track down the sought after presents, buy them, fret about shipping, wrap them all and display them under the tree with artistic intention and even distribution, decorate the house, bake the cookies, and plan the Christmas eve activities with enough magic to tire out the kids while they wait for the reindeer hooves to hit the roof.
Last year after my mother’s passing I decorated for the family. That was the only level of magic I was capable of faking. This year I decided to shove so much fake cheer up my own ass, I feared choking on a ball of tinsel.
But no matter how many Christmas books I read or movies I watch, they don’t fool me into happiness. I feel dread instead.
Magic is not in the holiday cards
Not for me anyway. I have snippets of good Christmas memories from childhood tainted by vodka induced trauma.
This one is proving to be just as difficult. With last years protocols, my mom’s absence wasn’t as glaringly obvious in a smaller celebration. My grandmother was there. A new covid outbreak in her Long Term Care home is making me think she might be missing this year too.
If we do manage to break her out for the day, Christmas is a hard time for the extended family to find out if dementia has stolen their identity from her memories.
Then there is some drama between the old cook and the new cook. The old cook was my dad and though his food was among the tastiest for a long while, it always came at a pretty steep cost.
There was always yelling, swearing and banging. Sometimes whole plates of food landed in the garbage. Pots too.
The turkey was often transported from one end of the kitchen to another for carving, producing such a mess on the floor, one would think Exxon Valdez had sponsored the dinner.
The new cook (my husband) took the reigns quite a few years ago when the pre-drinking started a fight that stopped all cooking without warning.
My husband is famous for his ham. It requires no effort at all but gets all the praise. From every single guest. Multiple times a night, and well into the next year.
There is animosity from the old cook to the new every time the famous ham is requested and gushed over. Old cook doesn’t understand how this new generation of hams is better than the ones he made for 40 years for the exact same guests without the same fanfare.
The new generations of turkeys and hams are 100% drama free. I mean, there is no sticker on them but we all notice how effortlessly quiet they really are.
Nothing tastes better than drama free Christmas dinner.
Christmas goodies and real delights
On the menu this year is meat pies on Christmas eve and cinnamon rolls on Christmas morning. This and our dog walk to see the lights on Taffy Lane is the joy I am holding onto.
This year, as every shopping trip starts and ends in tears, I doubt the possibility of any kind of magic. As a matter of fact, don’t rely on me. My Christmas is coming apart at the seams, like all those Christmas bags I save from year to year.
I will be happy to see my family in one house at one time. It has been years and even so we are no longer whole.
Plus if I don’t bring my cheeseball, I am pretty sure they won’t let me in.
As I shop for purposefully ugly sweaters that cost more than shirts I actually want to wear, I am super nice to anyone I encounter presuming they may also have ducked into the mall washroom to release some tears.
Incidentally I will be showing up to my work Christmas party in a holiday PJ top paired with jeans, holding my cheeseball and my travel mug of coffee will be spiked.
Anything to get through. That’s what a lot of us do. One day I may get some magic spirit back. I hope so because it can be really jolly.
Even writing this article gave me pause but without a time machine that flies me past that day entirely, I am putting a lot of pressure on that drama free ham!!!
