(Relatively) Alone at Christmas

I am not sure how much "count your blessings" advice Singles can take at Christmas time. As I recall, Christmas is a lonely time of year to be Single. It is also a lonely time of year to be apart from your family, if you are an expat like me, but if you are a happily married expat, you can't really complain too much.

I definitely cannot complain too much because I keep thinking about all those families in Connecticut facing a first Christmas without those little children who were so looking forward to it (and, of course, the families of the murdered teachers). Sometimes I am sad that I have no children, but then something like what happened happens, and I think, nothing can be that sad. Yes, I am sure the families are grateful that they had their little ones for six or seven years, but... Eeek. I don't want to think about it anymore.

There is no such thing as a perfect Christmas. I wonder if we don't get the longing for a perfect Christmas confused with our longing for that truly perfect and everlasting Christmas we hopefully will one day see. As for romantic Christmases, I come from a big family so I have never associated Christmas with boy-girl romance but with family.

Before I got married to B.A., at Christmas I put being home to family above everything and everybody, except the Infant Jesus at Mass. Then I would walk miles to get to Midnight Mass and then miles more to be with my family on Christmas Day. I know this for sure because I have indeed walked at least one mile in the freezing cold dark night from a train station to get to Midnight Mass and then one and half miles from the subway station to get home to my family.

My first married Christmas, the only family around was B.A., and how I cried, poor man.

My second married Christmas, my parents and one brother and one sister came, so I was very happy.

My third married Christmas, the other sister and her son came, so I was again very happy, although more tired, as my mother wasn't there to do the toughest cooking jobs.

This married Christmas, my family isn't coming, and B.A. and I couldn't afford to go to Canada, so we are having Christmas Eve and Christmas Day dinners, having collected as many Single friends as have not got other Christmases to go to. This is not for them as much as it is for me, as the idea of Romantic Couple Christmas--me, B.A. and a chicken--is shockingly pagan to me. Valentine's Day is for couples. Christmas is for family, or if you haven't got any family, friends.

However, I am sympathetic to those Singles who watch romantic comedies set around Christmas time and think they are really missing something if they can't go mittened hand in gloved hand with a man to the local Christmas market and drink hot apple cider together. B.A. said he always felt cranky when he could not do Christmas market-y stuff hand-in-hand with somebody. Amusingly, although we have been to the Edinburgh Christmas market with family twice, we have never gone by ourselves. This hand-in-hand thing with mittens, gloves, snowflakes and apple cider never really happens, which is okay, since life is much richer and more joyful than anything Hollywood can come up with.