When I was a kid, we always had two Christmases. I'm sure a lot of families were like ours. The first Christmas was actually Christmas Eve. We'd gather around the tree in the early parts of the day, just Papa Goat, Mama Goat, Sister Goat, and me. We'd open a couple of presents early. Usually those presents were designed to give us some evening family activity. Maybe we got new stereos and listened to music together, or board games we could play that night while drinking warm apple cider. One glorious year, we got a Super Nintendo, which was quite the upgrade over our Atari 2600. My sister and I played Mario for hours, and then I squared off against Papa Goat with the first ever version of John Madden Football.
But then, we'd go to bed, and get up early the next morning, and drive to Ohio for second Christmas, or Real Christmas, as it were. The presents we didn't open would go with us, and be added to the large pile under the tree at Grandpa and Grandma Goat's house. A table in the middle of the living room would be set up with various snacks - bowls of M&Ms and mints and other candies, of course, but the star of the show was always the large bowl of unshelled nuts, with at least two nutcrackers handy, so people could stand there and have a conversation without having to awkwardly take turns going after the walnuts. Mama Goat and the other women would help Grandma in the kitchen while the menfolk ate nuts and talked about the year. Then we'd have an incredible meal, and drowsily make our way to the tree for another round of opening presents. After this, as it started to get dark, Grandpa would pull out the projector and show home movies. The same home movies we watched every year, but everyone loved them no matter how many times we saw them.
Then, just as us kiddos were falling asleep, we'd drive home, and Papa Goat never took a direct route home, because he knew the best path to take to see all the very best light displays. One farmer set up a huge display every year, out in the middle of nowhere, that was sort of an amusement ride. His semi-circular driveway had an entrance and and exit, and cars would pull in and slowly drive through the middle of this extensive explosion of lights. There was no fee for this. Just some guy who set up this display every year so that traveling parents could take a break from the monotony of the road and give their kids in the backseat something to gawk at.
Thirty years later, I'm sitting here at my desk, and sitting in front of me is the contact information I need to set up a Christmas call tomorrow between Mama Goat and Grandma Goat, with the help of the nurses at Grandma Goat's new, and last, home. No longer able to live safely in the outside world without 24-hour supervision, but still as healthy as someone half her age, according to her doctors, Grandma Goat is unlikely to ever see the house again that we spent so many Christmases in, though she's likely to spend a great number of new Christmases trying to remember how she's related to the person she's talking to over Zoom. A number of the other people we spent those Christmases with have long since gone to their own last homes, although theirs without nurses, and with only dirt and marble and the other departed to keep them company during the holidays.
People often say life is short. I think they are wrong. For the unlucky, sure, it can be short, but for most of us, it isn't. It's long. But it's also inexorable. Steadily moving, in only one direction, and every Christmas past is past forever. And eventually, we come to the point where we realize those Christmases we had in the past won't ever happen again. This year will be our first not going to Ohio, because Covid, but it won't be the first that isn't the same as Christmas once was. Last year, we went to Ohio, but we didn't have walnuts and home movies and large groups of relatives catching up. We had five people eating lunch meat sandwiches.
This is probably the darkest - or at least the most melancholic - of all my Xmas sermons, and it's not really a sermon. I'm not looking to make any theological points this year. Just an observation about life. In the time of Covid, we often feel like life has reached a turning point, but I think it's more likely that Covid has highlighted and brought out into the open the turning points we've made already. Covid isn't what took my childhood Christmases away from me. Cancer, heart disease, drugs and alcohol, and of course, above all, the still undefeated Father Time took them away.
So many losses, and not just IRL. We've had losses here in our virtual community, too. Andy, Kref, Buzz. It's insane to think we've been here so long to have shared such losses.
Anyway, I wanted to eventually shift this back to something positive, and I don't know how, so I'll just force it. The great thing about these Christmases past is that, though they are gone, they are never forgotten. The memories I have of sitting out in the garden house and waiting for the wood stove to warm up the stone floor so we could all slip off our shoes and feel the warmth through our socks are as strong as the memories I have of my commute home today. Those memories are thirty years old and still fresh, and God willing, they will remain that way.
This is going to be one of the most difficult of all Christmases for many of us, but do try to remember all those great Christmases you already had, and don't forget that they remain with you in the sense that they are part of what made you who you are. And think of the Christmases to come, and though they may be different, we can still make them positive and make new memories from them. When this whole Covid thing is over, I plan on taking Mama Goat to Ohio again to spend a Christmas with her Mama at her new home. I think I'll bring walnuts.
If you've made it this far, thank you for allowing me to share these holiday thoughts with you. I know they are rambling and perhaps even directionless, but the thing about burdens is that you have to shed them, sometimes violently, like a dog shaking off water.
Merry Christmas, Water Cooler, and God bless.
But then, we'd go to bed, and get up early the next morning, and drive to Ohio for second Christmas, or Real Christmas, as it were. The presents we didn't open would go with us, and be added to the large pile under the tree at Grandpa and Grandma Goat's house. A table in the middle of the living room would be set up with various snacks - bowls of M&Ms and mints and other candies, of course, but the star of the show was always the large bowl of unshelled nuts, with at least two nutcrackers handy, so people could stand there and have a conversation without having to awkwardly take turns going after the walnuts. Mama Goat and the other women would help Grandma in the kitchen while the menfolk ate nuts and talked about the year. Then we'd have an incredible meal, and drowsily make our way to the tree for another round of opening presents. After this, as it started to get dark, Grandpa would pull out the projector and show home movies. The same home movies we watched every year, but everyone loved them no matter how many times we saw them.
Then, just as us kiddos were falling asleep, we'd drive home, and Papa Goat never took a direct route home, because he knew the best path to take to see all the very best light displays. One farmer set up a huge display every year, out in the middle of nowhere, that was sort of an amusement ride. His semi-circular driveway had an entrance and and exit, and cars would pull in and slowly drive through the middle of this extensive explosion of lights. There was no fee for this. Just some guy who set up this display every year so that traveling parents could take a break from the monotony of the road and give their kids in the backseat something to gawk at.
Thirty years later, I'm sitting here at my desk, and sitting in front of me is the contact information I need to set up a Christmas call tomorrow between Mama Goat and Grandma Goat, with the help of the nurses at Grandma Goat's new, and last, home. No longer able to live safely in the outside world without 24-hour supervision, but still as healthy as someone half her age, according to her doctors, Grandma Goat is unlikely to ever see the house again that we spent so many Christmases in, though she's likely to spend a great number of new Christmases trying to remember how she's related to the person she's talking to over Zoom. A number of the other people we spent those Christmases with have long since gone to their own last homes, although theirs without nurses, and with only dirt and marble and the other departed to keep them company during the holidays.
People often say life is short. I think they are wrong. For the unlucky, sure, it can be short, but for most of us, it isn't. It's long. But it's also inexorable. Steadily moving, in only one direction, and every Christmas past is past forever. And eventually, we come to the point where we realize those Christmases we had in the past won't ever happen again. This year will be our first not going to Ohio, because Covid, but it won't be the first that isn't the same as Christmas once was. Last year, we went to Ohio, but we didn't have walnuts and home movies and large groups of relatives catching up. We had five people eating lunch meat sandwiches.
This is probably the darkest - or at least the most melancholic - of all my Xmas sermons, and it's not really a sermon. I'm not looking to make any theological points this year. Just an observation about life. In the time of Covid, we often feel like life has reached a turning point, but I think it's more likely that Covid has highlighted and brought out into the open the turning points we've made already. Covid isn't what took my childhood Christmases away from me. Cancer, heart disease, drugs and alcohol, and of course, above all, the still undefeated Father Time took them away.
So many losses, and not just IRL. We've had losses here in our virtual community, too. Andy, Kref, Buzz. It's insane to think we've been here so long to have shared such losses.
Anyway, I wanted to eventually shift this back to something positive, and I don't know how, so I'll just force it. The great thing about these Christmases past is that, though they are gone, they are never forgotten. The memories I have of sitting out in the garden house and waiting for the wood stove to warm up the stone floor so we could all slip off our shoes and feel the warmth through our socks are as strong as the memories I have of my commute home today. Those memories are thirty years old and still fresh, and God willing, they will remain that way.
This is going to be one of the most difficult of all Christmases for many of us, but do try to remember all those great Christmases you already had, and don't forget that they remain with you in the sense that they are part of what made you who you are. And think of the Christmases to come, and though they may be different, we can still make them positive and make new memories from them. When this whole Covid thing is over, I plan on taking Mama Goat to Ohio again to spend a Christmas with her Mama at her new home. I think I'll bring walnuts.
If you've made it this far, thank you for allowing me to share these holiday thoughts with you. I know they are rambling and perhaps even directionless, but the thing about burdens is that you have to shed them, sometimes violently, like a dog shaking off water.
Merry Christmas, Water Cooler, and God bless.
