As I apparently haven’t had enough to deal with this year already, and I haven’t had enough to cast a gloomy pall on the holidays, I found out on Saturday that Bubba, one of my dogs, might have a malignant tumor. This was the last straw. My last spec of holiday cheer that was hanging on by a thread was broken. Fuck this holiday, fuck this year, fuck everything. I threw up my hands and decided that I was cancelling Christmas. I have no cheer, I have no goodwill, I can’t even manage to feel anything but numb. I’m jumping on board with Michelle Featherstone and Cancelling Christmas.

Later that day, I was riding in a car with my best friend and she mentioned that for the first time in a long time (since her mother died) she was actually enjoying holiday decorations and looking forward to festivities. I scoffed, and told her that she must have taken my holiday enthusiasm, because unlike my normal mania, I had none. My Christmas decorations weren’t even up yet, and I probably wasn’t going to put them up at all. What was the point? Then there was a silence. I couldn’t have guessed what she was going to say after that silence if you had given me a hundred guesses. She told me that I wasn’t allowed to cancel Christmas, because I was the only reason that she had started to like the season again and if I weren’t celebrating, then where did that leave her.

I had no idea. I had no idea that my indefatigable zeal toward all things Christmas meant anything to anybody but me. I had no idea that my need to reclaim the holiday and create happiness for my own life, was facilitating healing in hers. Apparently her mother was very much like me around the holidays, “vomiting Christmas” wherever she went. (My friend’s words, not mine.) How being around me helped instead of making Christmas harder, I don’t know, but I’m glad that it did. And I’m especially glad that she told me. I needed the reminder this year that Christmas is about the people around you and the people in your life that you care for, and bailing out affects them just as much as it does you.

So Christmas is no longer cancelled. The decorations have been “vomited” throughout the house and I’m doing my best to approximate holiday cheer. Learning that Bubba’s lab work came back looking positive and the vet can get him in for surgery on Friday has helped. If all goes well, he’ll be good as new by the New Year. Missing part of one ear, but healthy, and that’s what counts.

Photo by Lori Fusaro