Dreaming of a White Christmas

In the middle of the week, my big dog, Andy knocked into my injured leg, aggravating the injury afresh.  It wasn't Andy's fault, there was a bit of chaos coming in the door, and it wasn't the kids' fault, since they haven't noticed or been told that giving the command to "back" had been dropped since it wasn't being enforced regularly.  It was just a painful accident.

In addition to the accidental bashing by the dog, we had snow and ice around Southern Idaho.  I had flirted with the idea of ordering spikes for my crutches, but decided to wait.  Amazingly, a dear friend must have felt a presence in the Force, because she felt compelled to send me the tips.  I'm kind of disappointed that the snow and ice are melting because these things are awesome.  I wish I would have had them a long time ago.  I bet if I pair them with my snow boots, I'll be a clomping, abominably crippled snow beast, and small children will stare in awe at me.  They stare already, but that's beside the point.

Speaking of white Christmases, my husband and I realized that with all that was going on, we needed to get the kids a Christmas tree.  This year, more than ever, its important to try to pull ourselves together and focus on the traditions we have for Christmas.  We place a premium on enjoying the entire season of Advent and Christmas, with rituals and decorating to reflect that.  We aren't extravagant people, and we've never spent exorbitant amounts on Christmas.  We don't celebrate with Santa Claus (although we do talk about the tradition of Saint Nicholas, and why his actions were important), but we have other traditions that we hold as more important than the jolly fat man, dressed in red, giving gifts.  

Every year, we go down to the Santa's Elves tree lot, operated by Gene Kelly, and pick out a tree to bring home.  We knew we couldn't really afford the price of a fresh tree this year, so we weighed our options.  We considered going out to get our own, but decided against it because of my knee, plus the cost of gas and worry over the tires.  This left us with fewer options for Christmas.  Neither of us are willing to forego a tree, considering how much else the kids have managed without lately.  So as my husband and I went from thrift store to thrift store, we realized that we couldn't even afford what was left there.  I swallowed a bit of pride (mmm.... pride, it goes down like cold gravy, thick and so lumpy), and asked on social media if someone had one we could borrow.  This request was quickly answered, thus for the first time, we have a white Christmas tree.  

This year's tree is not as grand as trees in the past, and we didn't expect it to be.  My husband and I grimaced a little at the green stringed lights against the white limbs, and how the entire tree glows pink, but the kids love it.  We started to grouse at the kids for their ornament choices and then stopped ourselves.  To us, it wasn't what we were used to and there was that tinge of regret that we didn't have the 9 foot tree of years' past.  I'm not sure the kids really care that the tree isn't fresh, or tall, or green.  It would be easy to only focus on what we are missing, but we can't allow ourselves to do that.  The kids love the white glowing marshmallow tree, decorated with their favorite ornaments.  And because of that we do too.  

In this season, we might want everything to be perfect so we can ignore that it isn't, but that's not the right way for our family to go about this. We have to acknowledge that things aren't the same as they were before.  Its ok to not to have a perfect, middle-class, American, Christmas.  We can create a Christmas that is full of hope, peace, joy, and love.