Wine glasses are filled and Pop reaches far back into a kitchen cabinet to retrieve a bottle he will use to top off the eggnog. The ornaments were handmade by Charolette’s cousin, Boots, many years prior, and they are the only tree ornaments I will ever know inside this house. A thousand tiny white lights shine on the Christmas tree, which is filled with so many jeweled and ribboned ornaments we can barely distinguish one branch from another.
We redress in blue jeans and sweatshirts, getting comfortable for the festivity ahead. We have left the church and returned to Bob and Charolette’s home. I watch the memory for a while before shaking the globe again, and the memory fades out like a dream sequence as another forms in its place amid the falling snow. This is Christmas to me – holy and unrushed, simultaneously simple and resplendent. As Mass begins the smell of incense tickles my nose and makes my eyes water, but I love the tradition of it all. Deep red poinsettias and several Christmas trees decorated only in lights flank the altar while a large, solitary manger stands nearby. We greet and are greeted by familiar faces throughout the sanctuary, which is adorned in boughs of greenery. We genuflect and file in, filling the pew almost to capacity. We enter the church and head up the center aisle to our familiar pew on the right-hand side six rows from the front. Bob and Charolette walk beside us, elegant in their Christmas attire, as we are joined by Victor and Melissa and then by John and Kasie. Dominic offers me his arm, and I loop my own through his and snuggle close against his suit jacket, resting my cheek against his shoulder as we walk. The air is bitterly crisp and I clutch my winter-white wool dress-coat tightly around me.
I shake it and a memory forms, its edges slightly blurred. When I reflect on that time of my life it is as if I am seeing it transpire inside a snow globe.
Crazy little thing called love lyrics meaning full#
And I accept that those memories may have to remain only memories, being that so much has changed within our family since the days when we were young, just beginning our adult lives, full of hope, possibility and promise. They say you can’t go back, and I accept that really I do. Of all my memories, our family’s attendance at Midnight Mass and the wee-hours celebrations that followed are some of my most treasured. (Even in college, it was well known that Dom would be the first one to call it a night and go to bed.) Once we had children, Midnight Mass was no longer a viable option for our schedules. He staunchly refuses, stating in no uncertain terms that he is over any desire to stay up late enough to attend Midnight Mass on Christmas Eve. I frequently tease Dominic that I’m going to start dragging him back to Midnight Mass during one of these Christmas seasons in our future. In the spirit of the season I’d like to raise a glass to Christmases past, and to my family who made them magical. It has been through several edits since Pop’s illness and death, but the original version below is one of the happier essays and captures the joy and peace with which I have always viewed Christmas Eve. I began writing the collection just as the dust started to settle from Charolette’s cancer, and before the storm of Pop’s.
What follows was originally intended to be one chapter in a larger collection of essays that chronicles our family’s journey through cancer over the past three years.
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