My friend, Samantha, shared her day with me. In the midst of her Christmas preparations, she encountered a few people who were not filled with the holiday spirit.
The driver in the next vehicle decided Sam deserved obscene gestures for her lane change. A fellow shopper was positively rude while trying to get by in the department store’s display-clogged aisle. And an office colleague sent her an e-mail that was unkind and uncalled for.
My friend, Samantha, shared her day with me. In the midst of her Christmas preparations, she encountered a few people who were not filled with the holiday spirit.
The driver in the next vehicle decided Sam deserved obscene gestures for her lane change. A fellow shopper was positively rude while trying to get by in the department store’s display-clogged aisle. And an office colleague sent her an e-mail that was unkind and uncalled for.
But Sam is a smart cookie. She decided that if mean people were the worst of her troubles, she still had a pretty good.
While struggling with my own Christmas errands, Sam's good attitude has served me well. It certainly helped me not get too bent out of shape fighting traffic near the mall, trying to find a certain shirt to wear to someone's Christmas party, or discovering the ingredients for the dish I planned to take to the potluck are not in my cupboard.
You see, those situations are mere inconveniences compared to what lots of people are dealing with this Christmas.
One friend has spent a sizable portion of the holiday season a few hour’s drive away, helping care for his father-in-law who suffers from dementia. Another spends most evenings at the convalescent center, trying to ease his mother's depression as she recovers from a broken hip.
Fact is, there are plenty of people whose already heavy day-to-day burdens weigh a little bit more come the holidays. Plenty of us know someone who wants nothing more this Christmas than to have a loved one back from a military deployment in some distant land. Someone told me about a woman looking after her toddler grandkids while their mother is locked up in rehab. One lady wrote about her son in jail; my heartaches for her and the thousands of families who have incarcerated loved ones.
And how many of us know someone who would give the world just to see a certain familiar face smiling from the couch on Christmas one last time? Now that both of their parents are gone, my cousins this year will gather in a different home for a very different holiday gathering. A late colleague’s offspring will not observe the long-standing Christmas morning tradition of calling their mother with wishes of cheer. And with my friend Helen’s demise, her husband will have to endure a vast memory minefield of the hundred ways his beloved embraced and celebrated the holiday season.
Sometimes the best you can do is acknowledge someone’s sadness. This year, the Christmas cards I send to these dear ones contain notes that are a little longer than usual. And my wishes for them include the hope their days and hearts grow a little lighter.
I daresay Samantha’s gift to us is a good one, something suitable for all year through. Here's hoping we remember that we really don’t have it so bad.
Pat Grimes, a former South Bay resident, writes from Ypsilanti, Mich. He can be reached at pgwriter@inbox.com
