Walking my spotted hound tonight, I counted about a dozen Christmas trees twinkling inside houses and apartments, and lots of houses and trees festooned with lights. This is a good neighborhood for decorations, starting at Halloween. I thought about all the friends I've made in my nearly two years on this street. We share news, gossip, power tools, parties and, last week, the joy of the new downstairs baby. Up on Los Feliz boulevard there are two side-by-side houses so gorgeously, brazenly blinking with multi-colored lights – Santa in a sleigh on the roof, reindeer, snowmen, candy canes – that they must be visible from outer space. Something like this:
Those sparkling Christmas trees glimpsed through windows (such a cozy, friendly tradition, to leave your curtains open so the neighbors can enjoy the view) evoke a primal joy and comfort, triggering memories of childhood anticipation, magic, security, happiness.
This will be the first Christmas of my life without a card from my Grandma, in the handwriting that grew shakier every year but whose expression of love never faded. She was the last of my grandparents. My dear great-aunt and uncle passed away this year too. Now that generation is gone. It’s been a difficult season so far, clouded by family squabbles and hurt feelings, and I’ve had to dig deep to try and feel the holiday spirit for brief moments. I brought home a little tree, four feet high, and a piney-scented wreath, and unpacked the ornaments and put the Christmas music on. I bought cards and stood in line for stamps, though I haven’t had the heart to write any cards yet. I made my list and checked it twice. Fake it till you make it, like the twelve-steppers say. I think this is a hard year for a lot of people, based on my unscientific survey of friends. The economy, the dying (but still surprisingly damaging) gasps of the Bush era. The weary world, indeed. I never understood till now why people complained about this time of year. Christmas has always been my favorite holiday, and except for a brief bout in my twenties with cynicism about its inescapable hegemony, its cultural imperialism even, I’ve embraced the Christmas messages of love, miraculous and thrilling; birth and hope in the midst of darkness.
That’s what those lights do for us – remind us of the ageless celebration of light in midwinter. They bring the starry sky close, even here in Los Angeles where tonight no stars can be seen through the clouds. No matter; there’s spicy woodsmoke and a clear damp freshness after three days of rain. My thirteen-year-old dog rapturously sniffed hedges, her tail jerkily wagging. O night divine. I’ll keep singing Christmas carols in my car and I’ll keep plugging in my little tree every night when I get home. I’ll see some of my loved ones on Christmas Day, and there will be others I’ll miss deeply. Grief, hope. Endings, renewal. A time when even we jaded city-dwellers find reason to soften, to celebrate, and find it in ourselves to be a little more generous than we are the rest of the year. It may not be perfect, but I’ll take what I can get.
