We all crave our Christmas traditions, even when they have to evolve
By George Valadie
“… while visions of sugarplums danced in their heads …”
I’m 72 years old and still don’t have a clue about sugarplums. Wouldn’t know one if I saw one. Never ate one either, at least not on purpose. And I don’t even know if you can.
But I do know all about visions.
Well, actually, they’re mostly those of my wife.
Not the corporate sort of formal “vision statement” we hear so much about these days. No, this is a sentiment more like “I had a vision how things should go … but they didn’t.”
When family plans go awry and someone suffers disappointment, one of us never fails to offer, “You know what your problem was? You had a vision. You should never have a vision. Haven’t you learned?”
Nancy’s been having them for years. Especially visions about how our family holidays should unfold. Traditions are huge here as they are with many families. So, change is hard for her.
Real hard. And if forced to give one up, she especially wants the new one to play out.
When the kids were little, they didn’t have much power to mess things up. But then … they got older.
When they were off at college, holding down the jobs we told them they must find, she’d ask, “When will you be home for Christmas?”
“Probably not until after work on Christmas Eve.”
“Well, no, that’s not gonna work, you have to come home before then.”
“But Mom, I have a job. I’m part-time. We get the crummy hours.”
“Well, tell them if you can’t get off, you’ll have to quit.”
“Seriously?”
“Seriously!!”
And she meant every word. No boss was ever gonna mess with my wife’s vision of Christmas Eve.
Again, a few years later, when our oldest was married and off to spend her first Christmas with in-laws, it was almost more than Nancy could take.
It’s not far off to say she was grieving. “I’m just not staying in this house at Christmas if all three of my girls can’t be here. We’re leaving and going back to Chattanooga.”
“But honey, your parents downsized. They don’t have any extra space anymore.”
“Then we’ll stay in a hotel.”
So, a new holiday vision was born for the kids who would be with us. Though I think she found it as painful as birthing the kids themselves.
We packed up our 1995 minivan with suitcases and winter coats, Christmas music and our wrapped-up gifts—for Christmas morning and the gatherings to follow with the 20-plus members of our extended family.
“Don’t forget, I want to be sure we take some Christmas decorations for the hotel room.” I thought she meant a string of garland to drape over the TV.
When she matter-of-factly added, “Don’t forget the tree and all the ornaments,” I thought she’d lost her mind. Ours was every bit of 7 feet tall and took up every bit of the space you’re imagining it would. In the car and in the room.
But when the girls informed her I wasn’t going to be able to squeeze it in, I found her sitting in the house. Tears in her eyes, old vision dead, new vision crumbling before it ever got started.
So I unpacked and re-packed—twice—and the Valadies arrived at the Marriott looking not unlike The Beverly Hillbillies. The two bellhops could only stare.
We laugh about it now. Especially the nut dish.
Nancy was our school secretary and had received a Yule-themed nut dish from one of the little kids. And for some reason, it, too, made the trip to be set out on the table between the two beds.
If there’s an irony here, it’s that it never saw the first nut. We don’t even like nuts. “Just a little piece of Christmas to make our hotel room feel more like home.” The same home she had wanted to escape.
Hotel room or not, Santa still had to find our two grown daughters to make her vision complete.
When the lights went down and the four of us were nestled all snug in our beds—but no one yet asleep—Santa got out of bed to do what Santa had done for the previous 25 years of our lives. With a wee bit less secrecy.
As I tripped into the tree in the dark, Nancy whispered, “Shhh! George, be quiet! The girls will hear you,” referring to our two adult daughters, just two feet away, who were both trying to muffle their hysterical laughing.
Everyone had a role to play in this vision.
But it’s what we do, isn’t it? When we love one another.
I feel assured there’s some sort of similar Christmas vision in your world, too. Maybe it’s Mass at a certain time. Or a reading of the Nativity in front of the fireplace. Maybe it’s a certain food. Or opening gifts in a certain order.
Maybe the vision is yours? Or your spouse’s? Or was it handed down from grandparents before or grandparents before them?
But they can’t always stay that way, can they? Sometimes we move. Sometimes we move on. New home, new state, new state of mind. Kids grow up. We add some family—and sadly—we lose some, too.
And that’s when the occasional loved one won’t know how to form a new vision ever again.
Whatever traditions will soon unfold with your gang, might I offer another to add to yours: let’s be nicer. It wouldn’t take much. We could hold a door. Offer a smile. Buy a coffee. We might let another driver turn or pass or piddle. We might let a comment pass, too. After all, who knows where their head is, who knows what vision of theirs just went bad?
Do we have to be red or blue, black or white, Christian or non-? Couldn’t we just be human, couldn’t we be nicer?
That may have been the vision of the newborn King.
Dear God—We all hope our lives get to follow a certain path. May ours also be about helping each other get there. Amen.
George Valadie is a parishioner at St. Stephen Church in Chattanooga and author of the book “We Lost Our Fifth Fork … and other moments when we need some perspective.”