Not A Perfect Christmas
I feel like I can still write about this since, technically, it’s still Christmas. According to the church calendar. I got my very first Christmas tree on my own this year, the first REAL one, and the first one at all since living on my own in college. The first one since my divorce. Since moving out of my parents house just a few months ago.
My ex-husband thankfully helped me pick it up, and I’m grateful that we’ve reached the point where we can get along. He’s got a lovely young lady in his life who I like quite a bit, and my kids adore her.
The tree goes up and I buy little inexpensive lights on sale, cheap, actually. About $2 a pack. I begged off a few ornaments from my parents, because I just didn’t want to buy large packs of generic ornaments for such a small Charlie Brown-like tree. Most of the ornaments are crafts my kiddos made at school, and things they made during their afternoons with my art teacher mother.
Would they notice? That there weren’t many ornaments to hang? The thought came briefly into my head. But the lights turned on and they delighted in seeing their creations hanging from their very own tree. They did not notice the imperfections.
Christmas is usually a broken time for me. Driving my kids through the lights at Chick-fil-A brings back memories of driving them through over and over again when they were little and I was in the middle of my divorce. Last year’s Christmas was hard because I wanted to be so much on my own, and I decided to stop working for myself and to find a job. I was this close to thinking I would not be able to find anything. A year later, I have a job- sort of- but am finding out that my payments will be reduced to less than half of what I was being paid. Yes, I got hired for insurance sales- and I’m so excited with each new meeting and knowing I can really help people, but I’m still scared. Now I have a home that my kids love, a car, so many more things to pay for. More worries.
I read an article recently about Christmas, that it isn’t really about perfection. That Christ came to us in a dirty, very much not perfect manger. It’s certainly another way to think of it.
I have some friends who have lost the light of their lives- their child. There are still others in our community who have also lost loved ones. I have friends who are feeling the pain of another holiday without a partner. I don’t feel like I can adequately make profound statements regarding God and love and Christ’s coming. I don’t think it’s my place. I’m not a theologian. I’m not a theapist.
The only thing I can do is look at my tree, and see it in my children’s eyes: perfect. And I can pray. And I can take the signs of God’s love and the continued life of those we love as they come, just like a rainbow appearing after the rain.
And then I can realize, my Christmas might not have been perfect in all the superficial ways, but truly it was perfect in the ways that mattered. I have my kids, my family, and an ever growing set of friends who love me as I am.
I wrote a poem years ago while I was still in high school about the light coming out of the darkness, about a constant struggle between light and dark. It’s really long, and I should probably edit it down, but it’s still one of my favorites. I think it speaks to what Christmas and the coming of the Christ child means to me. It’s really long, so I’ll just add the first part below.
Love to all y’all,
Molly
I
Child of the sunlight
Child among the stars
Child in the flowertops
Child brightest among all children
Child brighter still among those old
Bringing youth and light
To all
Child shining brighter in the dark
Than in the light
Brings salvation
To my night
Child of joy
Child of love
Child of light
Child of night
Child continue
To bring my life
In that little, bright lantern
You carry around you inside
Deep in your soul
How may I teach mine to grow?
Joy of child
Love of child
Light of child
Night of child
Bring your soul to me
In dead of night
Bring to me
You shining light
So that I might be saved
From those dead in night
