By the time you read this…
December 23, 2006 | 12:00am
By the time you read this, it will be almost Christmas, only two more days to go. My house will be clean, spic and span, ready for the holiday. My little Christmas tree, about 12 inches tall, has been arranged and decorated by me since the 15th. It is a candlestick shaped like a tree, hung with trim I received from Meg, plus last year’s big shoe I received from Winnie, plus three crystal discs that I bought at Carolina’s and will turn into necklaces as soon as the holidays are over.
As I write this column, my one-bedroom flat looks like Milenyo, the killer typhoon, blew threw it. There is a big chair loaded with things for my mother. Beside it another big chair loaded with gifts that need wrapping. Three or four other chairs are loaded with things that need sorting. The top of my dining table is loaded with beads that I use for making necklaces that I will give away for Christmas. Two huge suitcases full of clothes for the Bicol folk are packed and waiting to be picked up. By my armchair where I sit to watch TV, two small open bags wait for my sorting.
I sent my driver to my home in Calamba and asked him to empty my closets and bring everything home. He did that job well. Now my apartment is so cluttered. Little by little I’ve managed to pack clothes I want to give away and at the same time find room for the little things I want to keep. It feels like my life is in transition, and something tells me it is, but I don’t know where it’s going. I just know that by the time you read this my house better be clean.
As I attend to all these details – sorting, packing, putting away, tossing – I wonder where my Christmas spirit is. What has happened to it? I don’t seem to feel it anymore. Christmas to me has become a season of work, of pushing and pulling, of wrapping and writing. It is so much work and so little reward in the end. In fact, the reward is spending Christmas dinner alone in front of the TV set, watching blankly, replaying the details of the day, making a mental list of what I need to worry about next year. How absolutely distressing!
This may be a good time to say I have begun to dislike the commercial nature of Christmas. The need to pay the 13th month salary of everyone who works for you according to the law, no matter what kind of business year you’ve had. Hello! I have not had a good year. Do I need to do this? Why even bother to think about it? Just do it, without joy, without cheer. Just get it over with. Do your duty, I tell myself. The need to buy gifts for the people you are bound to see. I have made gifts for my daughter and her two children. This year I got that done. Next year I must include my son and his family. This year I just bought them gifts.
Now, see, I enjoy making gifts. I don’t enjoy buying them. Maybe next year I should become more aware of the approach of holidays and make more gifts. Then maybe by Christmas Day I will have more of the feeling, the high, the spirit. That’s a thought. For this year, I will just go with the flow, no matter how difficult it is to find my way through the mess in my house.
It will clear up, I tell myself. I will find the time to sit and finish the task of sending things to people who have lost everything. Then suddenly, I see. . .of course, that’s what I’m doing. That’s how I’m celebrating Christmas this year, by giving my things to those who need them more. It feels good. Who cares if I have no wreath on my door? Who cares if the Plexiglas tree remains folded under the kitchen table? Who cares if my Christmas tree is less than a foot tall?
This Christmas I take the time to thank God again. Mainly I thank him for giving me back my life in slow doses. For the first time since my stroke, I now feel truly alive, truly here, truly present. I began to slowly write again and now I am writing well again. I think next year I will be busy working, being truly productive again. I thank God for this great gift and the one thousand and one smaller gifts He sent to make me see how He has saved me. Maybe this profound gratitude is what Christmas spirit is at my age.
Yes, by the time you read this it will be almost Christmas. So Merry Christmas to all and to all – a good life!
Please send your comments to secondwind.barbara@gmail.com or lilypad@skyinet.net or text 0917-8155570.
As I write this column, my one-bedroom flat looks like Milenyo, the killer typhoon, blew threw it. There is a big chair loaded with things for my mother. Beside it another big chair loaded with gifts that need wrapping. Three or four other chairs are loaded with things that need sorting. The top of my dining table is loaded with beads that I use for making necklaces that I will give away for Christmas. Two huge suitcases full of clothes for the Bicol folk are packed and waiting to be picked up. By my armchair where I sit to watch TV, two small open bags wait for my sorting.
I sent my driver to my home in Calamba and asked him to empty my closets and bring everything home. He did that job well. Now my apartment is so cluttered. Little by little I’ve managed to pack clothes I want to give away and at the same time find room for the little things I want to keep. It feels like my life is in transition, and something tells me it is, but I don’t know where it’s going. I just know that by the time you read this my house better be clean.
As I attend to all these details – sorting, packing, putting away, tossing – I wonder where my Christmas spirit is. What has happened to it? I don’t seem to feel it anymore. Christmas to me has become a season of work, of pushing and pulling, of wrapping and writing. It is so much work and so little reward in the end. In fact, the reward is spending Christmas dinner alone in front of the TV set, watching blankly, replaying the details of the day, making a mental list of what I need to worry about next year. How absolutely distressing!
This may be a good time to say I have begun to dislike the commercial nature of Christmas. The need to pay the 13th month salary of everyone who works for you according to the law, no matter what kind of business year you’ve had. Hello! I have not had a good year. Do I need to do this? Why even bother to think about it? Just do it, without joy, without cheer. Just get it over with. Do your duty, I tell myself. The need to buy gifts for the people you are bound to see. I have made gifts for my daughter and her two children. This year I got that done. Next year I must include my son and his family. This year I just bought them gifts.
Now, see, I enjoy making gifts. I don’t enjoy buying them. Maybe next year I should become more aware of the approach of holidays and make more gifts. Then maybe by Christmas Day I will have more of the feeling, the high, the spirit. That’s a thought. For this year, I will just go with the flow, no matter how difficult it is to find my way through the mess in my house.
It will clear up, I tell myself. I will find the time to sit and finish the task of sending things to people who have lost everything. Then suddenly, I see. . .of course, that’s what I’m doing. That’s how I’m celebrating Christmas this year, by giving my things to those who need them more. It feels good. Who cares if I have no wreath on my door? Who cares if the Plexiglas tree remains folded under the kitchen table? Who cares if my Christmas tree is less than a foot tall?
This Christmas I take the time to thank God again. Mainly I thank him for giving me back my life in slow doses. For the first time since my stroke, I now feel truly alive, truly here, truly present. I began to slowly write again and now I am writing well again. I think next year I will be busy working, being truly productive again. I thank God for this great gift and the one thousand and one smaller gifts He sent to make me see how He has saved me. Maybe this profound gratitude is what Christmas spirit is at my age.
Yes, by the time you read this it will be almost Christmas. So Merry Christmas to all and to all – a good life!
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