Dimmed Spirits

This year, my Christmas spirit has a flavor peppered with longing, fatigue, and melancholy. Gone is the typical sweetness of the season. Rather than anticipation, I feel dread. A cloud of worry casts its shadow overhead. Actually, it’s more of an all-consuming fog. Time is fluid. My brain is mush. My heart is heavy.

There is a profound loneliness that shrouds me, despite being surrounded by people I love and who love me.

Covid and the looming ubiquity of Omicron has me scared. My firstborn is 800 miles away living his best life, and the house is quiet without him. My youngest has newly discovered freedom, thanks to a car and license, so he’s gone too. Both boys are compensating for stolen time since they spent months at home, not exactly what a teenager’s dreams are made of. We haven’t seen our extended families for years, and the risk of covid transmission and infection means we wait even longer for a reunion. We canceled our annual Christmas Eve party. Again. It would be irresponsible to host over 100 people under our roof, so yet again, we pause another tradition. The weather outside has been frightful, as in 76 degrees the week before Christmas. That is fucked up, yet no one seems to be taking the climate crisis seriously. 

I’m having trouble making my spirits bright.

I did decorate, though less than usual. We only just put up some lights on the house, a fraction of the bright mood we usually set. The boys used to trade off advent calendar duties, but now days pass with no one noticing the calendar isn’t up to date. I’m woefully behind on it all, and my lackluster creativity just makes me feel pathetic. I do realize there is much to be grateful for. We are healthy, most important of all. But this weighted blanket of malaise burdens my soul. 

And maybe the worst part of this year is that I wished away Time. I found myself willing to fast forward to just make the hour pass, the day end, the month shift, the calendar page to turn. It was an internal uproar because I simultaneously reflected on the swift passage of time as I got used to my oldest son, my firstborn, living, and thriving, 800 miles away in college. I struggled to hit both pause and fast forward, teetering in an unbalanced attempt to also be present.

Though my spirit is dull, I will reflect on all that’s gone right and embrace the moments of light that lift me.

Time is a gift, one that almost one million Americans lost.