'Tis the season?

Lights at the Coast Botanical Gardens, 2022

It’s supposed to be feeling like the holiday season, right? Last year, the first after losing my mom, I made a concerted effort to get into the holiday spirit. I calendared all the holiday crafts fairs, special activities in different communities, really decorated the house and we even attended a harvest dinner in Ukiah one evening. This year I haven’t made such an effort and I’m noticing a difference.

Part of the problem is that my husband and I both have had medical issues to deal with in the first part of the month. I had one of my teeth pulled last week, on the 6th. The dental office was decorated nicely and they had holiday music playing in the background, all nice touches. But having my favorite Christmas song, Silver Bells, play while I was being stabbed in the mouth with numbing shots was a bit too much. That was the worst of it, thankfully. The tooth fought hard to stay in and it was an ordeal, but at least it wasn’t painful. And I will say that while I have had some discomfort, mainly due to the change in my bite without that tooth, I have not had pain in my recovery.

Tomorrow, the 12th, my husband is having surgery. It’s something we knew was coming and he scheduled it so he would have a quiet season to recover. However, getting ready by doing all the things now he won’t be able to do after has not been very holiday-like either. He will feel a lot better after the surgery, even if it takes a couple of weeks to fully enjoy that feeling.

I’m struggling, too, knowing it will just be us this year. Our granddaughter will be at her other grandparents’ this year (we had her at Thanksgiving). I am learning, finally?, that we are going to have to find our own way to make the day special that doesn’t revolve around watching a small child open her presents. I’m not sure what that will look like yet, but you know I’ll tell you after the fact. We have put up the tree and started to decorate it. I am taking it slowly this year, actually making that part of the process. Usually it’s a marathon of putting up the tree, decorating it and the house and whew, done. This year I’m opening up my storage boxes one at a time and going through them. So the tree has lights, garland and a few glass balls and the Christmas towels are hung in the kitchen. Oh, and the deer head in the living room is sporting it’s Santa hat. By week’s end all that will be done should be done.

We did go to see the holiday lights at the Botanical Gardens this past Saturday with our neighbors and their little ones. That was really special, both because the lights are so pretty and because the reactions of the littles was so cute. We have a few holiday parties to attend and a trip to see my in-laws and our granddaughter before Christmas. Hopefully, those plus the medical stuff being in the past will help get us into the swing of the holiday season!