It’s the most wonderful time of the year. Christmas makes me think of those little village scenes you see where there is snow everywhere and the whole town is congregating to sing carols. Christmas means seeing family that we haven’t seen all year. Lights gleam up and down the neighborhoods. The UPS truck rings your doorbell with new packages. There are Christmas parties and Christmas pageants. Neighbors stop to say hi and bring cookies. It really is a most wonderful time.
Christmas can also be a very lonely time. I didn’t get married until I was almost 29, so I had a good decade of time alone. I know what it feels like to be separated from family. I know what it feels like to wish I had my own family.
I remember one year at Christmas, my brother and sisters were with their inlaws and it was just my mom, dad and me. I think we were all a little down because we were used to the chaos and enjoyment of our big family. It just didn’t feel the same as it should at Christmas.
My dad got an idea. It was Christmas Eve, and he looked up some places in the city where there might be a Christmas service. We found one. It was a midnight candlelight service at a small church. At 11:30, he and I dressed up, departed into the cold, empty streets, and drove to the church. The service was perfect. We sang carols and held candles. It’s one of my favorite Christmas memories.
If you are lonely this Christmas, find something special to do like my dad and I did. It could become one of your best memories for years to come.
Years ago Don used to do a lot of Seamen work as well as go to the downtown hotels in the Burnside area to invite people to church. One Christmas Eve we invited one of the hotel residents we'd befriended, a man from Truk Island, and also a divorced man with little contact with his family who was coming to church at the time to come to our house for dinner. They brought gifts for the kids and we had a lovely dinner, then sat around the dining room table with candlelight glowing, spending hours laughing and talking while the kids played with their new Christmas gifts. It has always been one of my favorite Christmas memories, opening our home to two people who otherwise would've been alone.
ReplyDeleteKris