Tag: family

Of Christmas Past

Posted on By jennego

So, now at New Years Eve, Christmas is over once again.

I used to like Christmas. I used to eagerly await the decorations, the lights, the stockings, the presents and fervently wish for snow where the green Christmas is the norm. But now it seems that Christmas just another day, perhaps another family gathering at the most.

I have memories of decorating the Christmas tree a few weeks before Christmas – hauling that increasingly ancient fake tree with permanent tinsel, putting it together and than decorating haphazardly with  blinking and non-blinking lights, actual decorations and ugly childhood  decorations. I have even fonder memories of sitting in my grandparents’ living room staring at the Christmas tree aglow, mesmerized. (Although I had a phase when I didn’t like any blinking lights and my dad managed to get the star to stop blinking for me).

But it’s all over now.

We don’t personally have a tree or anything even though I wanted one for years.

None of my grandmothers’ places (one for 24th and 25th) had holiday decor of any kind. On Christmas day, I also got to listen to my cousin’s list of grievance (well, just one grievance,, really, repeatedly)

The magic has gone. That’s for sure. I no longer hear the bells ring. I no longer am fascinated by the lights.

It’s just another day.

It wouldn’t surprise me if I just became another day – my family ties are not the strongest and the likelihood of me gaining a close friend ore something is low. For my mom’s  side of the family at least, it’s like they might as well not exist.

I still want a damn Christmas Tree. I want to put purple lights on it and decorate it with my horsy ornaments and such.

Family, in name only

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I always feel so distant from my family – especially one side of the family in particular. Aunts, uncles, cousins. It’s almost as if we were strangers that just happen to be related by blood somehow. But we don’t know each other. Not really. We just eye each other, not knowing what the other is thinking. Not knowing the other person. We’re just strangers who are in the same space based on the claim of shared bloodlines and/or martial relations. In some cases, such as with one of my grandmothers – we’re even separated by a lack of common language. So we’ve never talked. Not once. Probably not ever. And she’ll never understand. I could publish articles, write a book or whatever and she’ll never understand (unless it was translated, maybe).

To be honest, I haven’t even talked to my cousins from that side. As a child. I never played with them. To be they were always separate, strangers. Separate strangers.

I know they all look down on me. Maybe they won’t admit it but I know they do. I guess that makes sense. I’ve always been behind in terms of maturity and of course, socially. Even though they can speak English, it still seems that we are not speaking the same language.

Maybe it’s because my language is so textual, literary. I am way better at writing than speaking. There are a lot of words that I can write but cannot say.  My imagined conversations probably seem more scripted than spontaneous. I am so connected to this language (English) yet know nearly nothing about my ancestral language.

So we look at each other. Not knowing, not trusting. All we know is that we are supposedly related.