Happy Merry Winter Solstice

Into the shortest day and the longest night we go. The winter solstice happens at 11:28 a.m. EST on Dec. 21 -- which is when the sun is directly over the Tropic of Capricorn. At that moment, the North
Pole is tilted the farthest it can be away from the Sun. It's a culmination of all those dark days that have led up to this since late September, when going to work and returning is done in the dark. I dislike those days, so this, the last day of them, comes as a welcome relief. After today those dark days start to get shorter and shorter. We work towards the long hopeful days of spring and summer, those beautiful June days when the sun doesn't even decide to prepare setting until around 930 ish.

Traditionally over time the winter solstice has been celebrated with feasts, banquets of food getting together and eating and celebrating. Maybe those people (at least in the northern hemisphere) were so fed up with the dark and so depressed they had to make some merry. I am participating in much of that merry making these days, lots of celebrating and going to my friends and families homes and feasting. Now it's under the guise of pre Christmas celebrating. Maybe that is how Christmas came to be, until the Christians hijacked it and called it Christmas and said it was when Jesus was born. Like seriously how do they know? I think I will stick to this season being about celebrating the end of those long ass dark days.

I never was a big lover of Christmas. December 25th, that date that is a big deal to well mostly Christians and all their descendants. A day that creates a lot of running around and celebrating for one day, then it is over. Lots of those descendants don't have any foundation or knowledge in what they are celebrating, it could be July 21st to them, it's just a day. I wish it was July 21st, it would be warmer and I could be celebrating Christmas at the cottage, like I've always wanted to.  But for me the best part about this time of year is the meeting of family and friends at their houses and eating and celebrating before that December 25th date, the foreplay to Christmas so to speak.  Even as a kid, I loved the going to my aunts and uncles houses and visiting them best, not the gifts, in fact, except for turkey, the day was mostly anticlimactic.

Terry changed that for me, and having our children. He came from a family that knew how to feast, he was a lover of Christmas and it was contagious. He had all these traditions he wanted to embrace and make for us and our children. Buying them all new pj's about a week before and watching a Christmas movie, buying a new ornament to put in the house each year, coming up with a new ruse for the kids about santa and how he had arrived last night, getting that perfect gift the kids really wanted and pretending it was unattainable so he could see the surprise on their faces in the morning when they did get it.  And what he did for me!  Always surprising me with the perfect gifts, there was never enough he could get me, from diamond earrings to bedroom sets, to rocking chairs to lingerie to meditation cushions to cameras. He loved to surprise me, he would wrap the gifts so beautifully, no cheap paper from him, no matter how poor we were, only the best thickest shiniest most gorgeous wrapping. Sometimes he would decorate them with soft feathered birds that could later be put on the tree. Man he took the time and that said so much to me. He also used to get the last of my gifts on Christmas eve, he'd go out and say "oh I got something I need to do I'll be back later ", then the whole elaborate hour or two in the bedroom wrapping them on Christmas eve. It was his thing. It is a beautiful memory of my past Christmases that I will always cherish. He wrapped me in its magic with his kind thoughtful love. I miss him so. Not the gifts, but the magic he wrapped me in with these traditions, with his love.

And that brings me to the other point of this post. For widows and widowers this time of year sucks. We only have our memories, they comfort but they are a cold bittersweet comfort. They are like being wrapped in a warm blanket but unable to feel its heat. Those memories so precious hurt alot because no more are coming. Because they, not him, are all I have, because they fade over time, or worst because I see others making memories for their loved ones. This makes me happysad, it's awful to feel happysad- it's lonely and selfish and awful, but for me unavoidable- at least these past 4 Christmases now without him. I don't know what to tell others in this situation. What I have done (save for the first Christmas when I just cried and hated my way through it) is I have feasted and surrounded myself with family and friends. Yes I have faked the feelings many times, they just are not there, yes I look the other way and ignore the lovers exchange their gifts, but I go through the motions. I pretend sometimes.

When not pretending I am on the inside celebrating that long haul to the warm June days, the fact that the light days are coming up and I can soon walk at night in the woods with Pax, I am shopping for others and pretending I don't see that gift box below the lingerie in the store window. I am baking the cake Paige made me feel hungry again with, when Justin died, for others I love. I am feasting for others still hungry, for me still hungry. I do not know what else to do, I do not know what advice to give those who lost a spouse at this time of year. Tell yourself it's another day? Celebrate the end of dark days, embrace the happy merry winter solstice? Ignore it and go see a movie or have a fine meal in an empty restaurant? I'm sorry I don't know yet what works, if I find out I will let you know in a future blog. Truthfully, that day will never be the same after your spouse died so you need to make it your own different day. Honor those memories that you had in your quiet way, shed your tears if you want or need to and just get through it.

Perhaps you may even want to drop me a line here and tell me your story, about your loved one and Christmas, about how you get through it. I will hear your story and honor it with you.