The Christmas Letter 2021
It’s coming on Christmas
They’re cutting down trees
They’re putting up reindeer
And singing songs of joy and peace
Oh, I wish I had a river I could skate away on
From “River” a song by Joni Mitchell
I heard this song recently.
It’s a beautiful song.
But it’s kind of sad.
I guess we have all had times in our lives when we wished we had a river we could skate away on.
As I write this on an early December evening, I was reminded by a social media post that on this day one year ago, just a few weeks before Christmas, a friend of mine from my hometown of Oceanport, New Jersey had succumbed to complications of the Covid 19 virus.
His daughter posted a photo a few days ago also on social media, of this year’s Christmas decorations on their house with the comment “We didn’t even have a Christmas tree last year….but we decided to make up for it this year.”
Yeah, buddy.
I remember Christmases like that. The Christmas of 2002 when we had to have Christmas somewhere, anywhere but not at our home. Too many memories for that, so we ended up in a house in Deep Creek, Maryland. And the Christmas of 2018 when we didn’t put up a Christmas tree either for the first time in my life because we just weren’t feeling it.
But then in 2019, with the kids coming up from Florida we tried to regroup and be festive. And we had a nice Christmas.
Then just a few months later, the virus shut us down.
Christmas 2020 was spent spread out with Kim’s mom on Christmas Eve, my parents on Christmas Day, and the local kids a couple of days after Christmas.
Holiday distancing to allow for social distancing.
I am sure for Christmas 2020 there were probably many who wished they “had a river to skate away on. “
But this year, though not everything has returned to the way it was back in 2019, we are trying once again.
And like my friend’s daughter Michelle and her mom Linda and their family, again with the Florida kids coming up to Virginia for Christmas, we decided to try to make up for it this year too.
Kim and I were already a little ahead of the game preparing for this Christmas in that we had never taken our Christmas tree down from last year.
Yeah, I know that sounds weird, but it kind of fit in with all the other plants, even though it was artificial.
We decided we would enjoy it all year long.
So we decorated the tree for the Kentucky Derby, then the Preakness, and the Belmont. Then in July for the Haskell. Those Haskell hats remained on the tree until I finally took them down the weekend before Thanksgiving.
In fact, over the weekend in October when Savannah and Leon got married, Christian happened to find the one lone ornament from the Christmas before, that we overlooked taking down.
Appropriately so, it was an angel.
So, on the Sunday before Thanksgiving, with the angel continuing to watch over us, all those hats were replaced with Christmas ornaments. And the decorating continued in the weeks that followed, inside and outside the house.
Joni, in her song “River,” goes on to explain she lives in a part of the world where everything is always green:
But it don’t snow here
It stays pretty green
Though the desire to escape is real, the hope of having a frozen river to skate away on, is just that, just a hope. A sad one maybe, we can’t always skate away from the unexpected.
Because the truth is:
It’s coming on Christmas
They’re cutting down trees
They’re putting up reindeer
And singing songs of joy and peace
Christmas is coming.
And the Christmas season is a time of hope, a time of renewal, a time of anticipation of what is to come as we prepare to celebrate the birth of Jesus on Christmas Day. As well as to anticipate what that will mean for us in the coming New Year.
A time of joy and a time of peace.
And maybe… that hope, and that joy, and that peace is our “river.”
So put your skates on.
Postscript:
Kim and I would like to wish all our friends and family a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! And a special Christmas blessing to all our new friends at the Laurel View Village in Davidsville, Pennsylvania, and Signature HealthCARE at Mallard Bay in Cambridge, Maryland.
It’s a Thursday evening and as I sit here writing wearing my vintage Troy Polamalu Bumblebee Pittsburgh Steelers jersey, I will soon need to put down my pen to prepare to watch the Steelers play the Vikings on Thursday Night Football, in hopes that by the time I rest my head on my pillow tonight I will not be wishing there will be a river, or maybe three rivers that I and all other Steelers fans could skate away on.
Lastly, I will leave you with another thought from another post I saw on social media today from our friends at Christ Church in Easton, Maryland that I thought was fitting:
Life requires many responsibilities of us each day, and so many of them don’t go according to how we had planned or expected. Joseph was required to go with Mary, his wife, back to his hometown of Bethlehem. We can wonder about his thoughts as he was navigating this tedious trek home. But what we know of is the miracle that took place there, after they arrive!
Heavenly Father, help us to keep our eyes on you as we respond to the many responsibilities that we face each day so that we don’t miss the blessings that you pour out. Amen.
Amen.
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year from all of us.
Namaan, Alexa, Cameron, Savannah, Leon, Christian, Ethan, Kim, Curt, Hayley, Malcolm, and Donny too.
Post Postscript (added for this post December 21, 2021)
Shortly after finishing this letter, my aunt, Joan Christiansen passed away. I have referred to my Aunt Joan a couple of times before in these musings in You Are My Sunshine and Hello In There. She was special. We are all familiar with the proverb “it takes a village to raise a family.” But more often, it takes family to raise a family. When my sister, my brothers, and I and my cousins were kids, aunts and uncles were more like deputized parents. They stepped up as they needed to cover one another and keep us all safe. We shared our Christmases and Easters and other holidays too. We shed some tears and lots of laughs. We have many memories and on December 11 we had a little more of that sunshine taken away.
We sang “You Are My Sunshine” at her gravesite.
Prayers go out to my cousins and their kids and their kids too.
Here is “You Are My Sunshine” featuring my Aunt Joan.
Enjoy
