The Look of a Pandemic Christmas

We are all facing some version of a Pandemic Christmas!  

I thought I would share how mine looks this year.

As many of you know Christmas traditionally has been a hard time for me.  Some big and sad events have negatively colored my of enjoyment of Christmas.  Those sad memories center around losing my dad decades ago 3 days before Christmas and my mom in 2014 ... 3 days after Christmas.  And then there were the Christmases that my mom could not make it to our home - which had been her home for 5 years - forced by the circumstances of dementia - to stay in Assisted Living and finally in a nursing home during this festive time.  And let's not forget the military service families - my son spent time in the military and missed several Christmases with us.  That 'joy vs sadness scale' I struggle with every year always seems to tilt toward sadness.  

While there are those who can set those memories aside - like putting them into a box and sticking them in a closet, I cannot. It is part of my life experience.  Yeah ... the holiday is short on cheer for me.  Most years I would have just skipped the season if I could.  But family traditions pulled me forward even when I didn't want to go.

This year, however, was going to be special.  My grand daughter is 2 3/4 years old  (3 in February) and is now learning about Christmas in a way that will set the stage for many happy years to come!  She wrote her first letter (with her mom's help) to Santa and she decorated her own felt tree with felt ornaments.  Her letter was totally charming - asking for "a toy" for her and some treats for her dogs.  I knew that the joy of experiencing this Christmas would add some pluses in the joy side of the scale putting some balance back into this holiday for me.

Except - now we have this pandemic 

I won't be seeing my son, daughter-in-law or grand daughter this year.  I kind of expected that might be the case - with the virus surging.  So I prepared myself emotionally for that possibility.   Ok,  I told myself. I can do this Pandemic Christmas.   

I shopped on line for Christmas - no different from other years, so the Pandemic didn't change anything for me in that regard.  Ok, I told myself - no big change here.  

I usually have stockings filled with incidentals but not this year.  I shopped for those in person at a brick and mortar store ... but not this year, no stores, unless it is the grocery store.  Ok, I can let go of that kind of fluff.   

No Christmas sleep over with 3 dogs and one cat squeezed into a 2 bedroom condo with 5 people. Ok. I prepared for that as well - family gatherings being discourage while we are in the peak of this pesky pandemic.  My daughter and her dog, Milo, will be here (hopefully) and a scaled down celebration is appropriate.

My Christmas decorations are not out yet - decorations that are mostly just a Christmas tree.  We are waiting for a delivery date on our new windows and the installers need space to work.  Having the tree up - against the living room windows where I like it - would be a problem.  I'll give them until a few days before Christmas.  Then - that tree is going up, and they can schedule us in January.  Burr - I wanted to avoid January for changing out the windows. *sigh*

Gifts are wrapped like normal, but without bows.  I would have needed to go to a store for ribbon and it just wasn't a good enough reason to risk catching anything.  Besides ... the gifts will need to be transport to another house before Christmas and they will travel best without big puffy bows.  No biggie.

I was doing very well with the needed limitations for Pandemic Christmas this year, until ...

As I wrapped my grand daughter's gifts I could feel my eyes filling with tears!  Crap!! Her first real Christmas - the one where she discovered what Santa brought, the one where she experienced the excitement and joy of Christmas morning.  I wouldn't get to see that. I reached for tissues.  I was caught off guard by these thoughts.  I kept wrapping, faster now, because I needed to get past this.

Of course, the discovery that I really wasn't ok with all these changes could not be ignored.

As I moved on to wrapping gifts for others I got control of my emotions and scolded myself for such selfish self pity.  There are people who are missing family members for all Christmases into the future.  People struggling with the sadness of being separated from loved one in the hospital or nursing home ... loved ones struggling to breathe, maybe dying alone, and not even being able to be at their side to hold a hand.  And as I thought about those things I replaced my sorrow with anger!  

Some Americans have made this pandemic more serious than it needed to be because of their self-important opinion that masks and social distancing aren't necessary.  That no matter the number of deaths (in the US as of this writing - 300,000+ deaths), and no matter the number of pleas seen on TV and on social media from weary, overworked and emotionally exhausted doctors and hospital staff, their personal opinion and desires "trumped" every other consideration [quoted word used intentionally.]

I am pretty sure the replacement of sorrow with anger is not an improvement!  I certainly don't want to add anger to the catalogue of emotions I experience at Christmas time.

And then I saw on TV the first people - healthcare folks - get the new vaccine for Covid-19!  

I felt my eyes tearing up again.  Not in sorrow or anger, but joy!! We finally have something to be joyful about.  A first 'punch' back by the human race to fight against a virus that had taken so much from all of us.  My mind drifted then to all the truly unsung heroes -  researchers - scientific heroes who are faceless and seldom heard from, but sacrificed so much for 9 months to get to this point.  And the manufacturing entities and transportation teams that moved this virus from the laboratory to the patient with wartime speed and coordination.  And finally to all the doctors and nurses, who worked diligently under massive stress and sometimes massive sorrow - breaking at times to step outside and cry - but always returning again and again to their jobs!  

Ok, so now I am not angry anymore.  We all have a gift to be grateful for - every single human on this earth - and it came at the gift giving time when many of us honor the birth of Christ (Coincidental? I don't think so.)  It didn't come with any wrapping paper or bows, but I think we all got what we needed this holiday season - hope and a one-two punch against Covid-19. 

And just for the record ... this is a "Gorilla Size" joy -  may just have moved that lopsided 'joy vs sadness scale' in the right direction. 

I will have a husband and maybe a daughter with me this Christmas. I still have that amazing grand daughter ...  and she is the light of my life - whether beside me or not.  I still have all my family members even if we are not all together.  

I am blessed beyond words to live in a time when science can be heroic!