Not-Xmas

This started out as a response to a post in the Facebook group associated with the short online course I did with Lucy. 

I have hated xmas for a very long time. I didn't like it much from age 16 when stopped believing in God, because for me the meaning was gone. When I had my first kid, it became a nightmare as we had to trek from one set of grandparents to the other with tired kid/s who had been fed food that hyped them up and upset them. When my oldest was 6-7 my parents died 9 months apart - my mother was diagnosed with cancer on 20/12, admitted to hospital on xmas eve, and died New Year's Eve, so that made xmas pretty miserable for years of remembering. Then there were the city-living years of feeling obliged to do all the xmas stuff so my kids wouldn't miss out on the things all the neighbours’ kids got. As they got older we cut back on the presents, all agreeing one year to give to Save The Children instead, just giving small presents to the kids. But the food, decorations and stuff - the husband and 4 sons all wanted that but didn't help more than extremely minimally. I got more and more resentful and bitter.

Eventually the kids were grown and I said, No More. But still my kids wanted to get together and so it has evolved: 25 December is Not-Xmas at our place, all day and into the next, for anyone who wants to come. BYO alcohol, bring food to share appropriate for whatever time you come. The only rule is, don’t use the C word (Christmas). Numbers have varied over the years, from 15 to 35, usually around 20, drifting through at different times. People who don’t ‘do’ xmas come. People who want to escape, come after overwhelming family lunches or dinners. People whose ex’s have their kids for the day, come. People bring friends I don’t know when they arrive. Young tourists far from home come. And I still make / buy extra food and drink, and do a bit of tidying and cleaning – but because it’s Not-Xmas, and it’s Not-Anything, I don’t feel the burden of expectations. It’s really lovely, and relaxed as we sit in the sun, and later sit by the brazier under the southern summer sky, and I guess it is, in its own way, a new tradition, almost ritual.

As I wrote about this, I realised that there’s a whole lot to be learned about listening to, and valuing myself, and about surrender. Having grown up learning that I was the least important person in the world, that everyone else’s wants and needs had a higher priority than mine, I lived (still do to a degree) in a state of resentment. When I believed in God, I found comfort in the belief that even though I was the least important, God still loved me, I was still important to him, but once God was gone, there was nothing, I was nothing.

I now realise that it is so important to be properly conscious of one’s own feelings and needs, and to acknowledge them as valid. If we start from there, it will be more likely that we can work out ways? compromises? (can’t find the right word, grrr) that work better for everyone. I can’t make other members of my family feel the same way as me about things, Christmas in this example, but there could surely have been ways to make it easier on me, rather than my doing it their way while filled with exhaustion, resentment and bitterness. A way that involved others contributing to the physical, emotional, mental workloads, and having agreed to that way, me surrendering lovingly to the compromise – a way that would then no longer be a ‘compromise’ but just the right way for our family.

The word ‘surrender’ when Lucy talked about it in the course, really stuck in my craw. I felt almost angry, listening to that session. And then I paused and went back and listened again.

At 68 I feel like I have spent most of my life ‘surrendering’ my life to others. But that is a different meaning of the word from how Lucy talks of it. My way of surrendering has been so negative, so grudging, so resentful, because I was giving up something of me that I wanted to keep, that I believed I needed. But by accepting the idea that I am a part of a bigger whole, I can allow my inner self to find ways to align to other parts of the whole – and for whatever reason, those words – accepting, align – feel more comfortable than ‘surrender’ which just has too many patriarchal, dominating undertones for me. And having acknowledged and written that, ‘surrender’ feels less intimidating!

Ah, I need to stop! And just sit with all this for a while – or rather to walk with it, as the wind has dropped, the rain and hail paused, and there is a little sunshine showing through the clouds.