It’s Christmas Eve and although I’m not a sentimental or religious person, Christmas Eve has always been magical for me. It’s the night we drive back to the house I was raised to spend the evening laughing with my family…my grandparents, parents, sister, aunts and uncles and cousins. It only lasts a few hours and then we drive away to see Victor’s family. It feels like it’s over in a second but that loud and wonderful second is what Christmas is about for me.
Today though I’m home alone and my family is scattered or working or otherwise MIA. I’ll still see them after the holidays, and tonight Victor and Hailey and I will celebrate alone with presents and a frozen pizza. And it will be wonderful, but not quite the same.
So this post goes out to all of you, but especially to those of you who celebrate as you are haunted with the sweet bitterness of things past, and of well-loved places that now only exist in your mind. It goes out to those who celebrate with the ghosts of the people who made the holidays special. It goes out to everyone who feels a little bit alone today.
You aren’t alone. None of us are.
I’ll be toasting you tonight. Yes, you. I’ll be toasting to friends and family who aren’t with us, both the ones that we miss and the ones that we haven’t even met yet. I’ll be toasting to you, my friend.
Happy Holidays, sweetness. I wish you happiness and magic. And I wish it for me too.
