The Ghosts of Christmases Past
and the specter of christmas present
I’m six years old and I’m tucked into bed in my brand new Winnie the Pooh pajamas, my gold Christmas dress hanging above me, my hair a mess of ribbons I refused to take out. Christmas is over and I sink into my pillow, exhausted, happy, ready to dream about my new toys and Santa and a day spent with family.
The winter holidays just hit different when you’re a child. I had idyllic Christmases, surrounded by cousins, gifts, holiday cheer. We sang carols, we exchanged presents, Santa came on Christmas Eve and ho-ho-ho’d his way through the night. The morning brought a feast for breakfast and more presents and the knowledge that I must have been a good girl all year. It was all so exceedingly pleasant, and I know my parents worked hard to make it that way for us.
Christmas seemed to last for weeks when I was a child. Friends and relatives coming in and out of our house, bringing bottles of wine and trays of cookies, it felt like the holidays stretched out beyond their prescribed days. One day would bring an aunt and uncle visiting, another day some of my father’s friends from the firehouse. Carolers would knock on our door, singing “O Holy Night” and Santa came by on a firetruck a few days before Christmas. The tree would magically be surrounded with presents on Christmas morning, dolls and records and board games.
When I got older, the tone shifted from one of receiving both presents and relatives to the giving part. I had to buy presents. I had to go visit people. I had to shop and wrap and worry that the gifts I was giving were right and good. It was exhausting, it was anxiety inducing, and it started to take a little bit away from the season for me.
It is the utter perfection in which those Christmases of my childhood existed that made it hard for me to to have the same kind of perfection when I was older. My parents - particularly my mother - set me up for disaster, in a way. I feel like I was never able to replicate those wondrous holidays of my childhood for my own children. Whether I was lacking the money to do so, or so deep in depression that I did not have the stamina to do so, I had a few years where Christmas for my kids might have been lacking. But I tried to make up for it in other years, in other ways. From sprinkling glitter on the floor to make magical santa tracks to spending hours driving from store to store looking for the latest Power Rangers toy, I tried my best.
Even as my kids aged and cared less about presents and more about just being together for the holidays, I strived to make my Christmas perfect. Decorating the house, putting up the tree, trying to remain festive while wrapping presents - something I loathe doing - I would make the best efforts to have the nicest Christmas I could, considering that each year my holiday spirit waned a little more. I struggled with Christmas, I almost grew to resent it but still, through gritted teeth I tried. It became a challenge of sorts, to make the days and the weeks leading up to it festive as hell. It’s not a challenge I always won.
It wasn’t until recently that I embraced Christmas and all its trappings again. Finding renewed happiness in my life because of other circumstances helped. I was more in the mood, more willing to make it happen. I put my tree up early, usually Thanksgiving week. I shop - exclusively online as I reject the very idea of malls - early, I get my presents wrapped and listen to Christmas music and try to revel in the spirit the holidays bring.
And here we are in 2020, a Christmas with a different feel to it, and I need that comfort and joy more than ever. I put my tree up on November 1st, letting the warmth of the lights comfort me at night. I started in with the music early, trying to let it set a tone. It’s been a hell of a year, one of strife, of anguish, of worry, and I so desperately want the joy of the season to permeate my house and my soul. I want to create the atmosphere of the holiday that my mother once created for me, one where I fall asleep on Christmas night satiated, a happy kind of exhaustion.
But this is 2020 and try as I might, that’s not going to happen. My sister in Rhode Island is not joining us this year. I will miss her and my brother-in-law and nephews. I will miss how boisterous they are, how their joyous noise fills the room. I will miss their jokes, the levity they bring to any situation. Sure, we’ll Zoom with them and open our presents “together” but the lack of their presence in the actual room will be palpable, and with that, the specter of Christmas present, one that brings the entire year with it, will float around us. There will be no seemingly endless parade of visiting friends and relatives this year. Everyone is keeping to themselves, no one is making the Christmas rounds. There’s a thin film of death and illness covering everything, and Covid will hang around us, the great elephant in the room this year.
It’s a year like no other, and so it will be a Christmas like no other. I’ll still go across the street to my parents’ house with my kids and my other sister will join us and we will wear masks to go with our Christmas pajamas while we open presents and try our best to fill the house with joy.
The ghosts of Christmases past will be there, hovering, watching. They will want to implore us to be happy and full of cheer, to sing carols and drink hot chocolate and make the day merry and bright. I’ll think of the dolls and records and board games, of Winnie the Pooh pajamas and gold lamé dresses, I’ll think of my kids opening Power Ranger toys and chasing their cousins around the tree and I’ll smile and try to feel great about everything. Nothing is normal this year and Christmas is no exception, and I can only do my best to please my past self, to make the ghosts of Christmases past smile.