....See? I wasn't kidding.
The closer and closer that Christmas gets this year, the more I wish I could just skip it. For the first time ever, I actually have an anti-Christmas spirit. I'd rather just pretend it doesn't exist. I'm not excited about Christmas shopping. I'm not eagerly anticipating opening presents on Christmas morning. Christmas Carols put me in an awful mood. I don't have warm fuzzy visions of watching A Christmas Story around the fire. In fact, I haven't watched any Christmas movies at all this year. In past years, I have been known to start the Christmas movies in August. Even The Polar Express, which is my absolute favorite Christmas movie and one of my favorite movies in general, is collecting dust on my shelf. I just can't make myself care this year.
Christmas is such supposed to be such a happy, joyous time. And honestly, I am not happy. I am going through a really difficult, stressful, painful, sad time right now, and I still have a long ways to go. Christmas seems to just exacerbate all of that unhappiness. I have a wonderful, loving family and more incredible, supportive friends than I deserve. Despite that, I'm very lonely right now. I'm still deep in grief over the loss of someone that meant the world to me. I still feel like a huge chunk of me is missing (apparently, the chunk of me that was Christmas crazy). There's only 1 thing that I really want right now. And it's not going to happen. Christmas spirit just feels so wrong and out of place right now. I almost wish I could just crawl into bed and say, "Wake me up on January 2nd. Save me a slice of Honey Baked Ham."
I'm finding little ways to help me through this. I have a tree up in my apartment. I'm doing Christmas shopping on the internet instead of going to the mall. But mainly, I'm praying. I've never been a person of super mondo strong faith. It was definitely there, but not something I've ever really been comfortable talking about with others. For me, my faith is a very personal "me" thing. Then it kind of fell to the wayside when I started high school. But for the past 6 weeks or so, I've been praying. I pray every night before I go to sleep. I thank God for all that I've been blessed with and that I'm thankful for, and then I pour out everything I'm feeling. Sometimes, I can remain calm. Sometimes, I lose all composure it turns into a bunch of garbled Whys and Pleases and "What do you want for me?"s. Sometimes, I pray and cry until I fall asleep. Sometimes, I just sit there and cry. But whenever I'm done, I always feel a profound sense of calm and release. I don't feel quite so lonely. I feel hope that things will be resolved. I feel loved. And sometimes, I even feel like maybe that Christmas spirit isn't quite so unattainable.
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