During the holidays there is more pressure on us to be or at least appear happy than there is on a seven year old girl at an over-the-top dysfunctional beauty pageant, with her mother manically spraying her dyed-blonde up-do and screaming, with drool pooling at the corners of her diabolically twisted lips, "TWIRL, HONEY, DO! THE! TWIRL!"
Oh, how we long to please. Personally, I went on a mission of shopping, overspending, secretly wrapping and taking out a second mortgage on our home to pay for the groceries for the wonder of Christmas Day well in advance of the actual day itself. Therefore, as it is now New Year's Eve, I can honestly say I've been in "holiday mode" since Thanksgiving which makes it at least a month. I'm exhausted.
Nothing went as planned. In fact, things went terribly wrong, largely due to the stress I was already under or, really, putting myself under, and still we love one another and still the kids jumped up and down saying old fashioned, 1950's type things like "Yippee!" and, yes, even "Yay!" The bad blood that occurred is not appropriate to share in this forum but suffice it to say, when my kids are finally gone away I am going to have a very good time in therapy. By myself. Alone with a therapist. Talking.
The amazing thing to me, though is the neverending abundance of love we share in our family. Sure there were disappointments with material items, time management, burning food and selfish agendas. Sure there was a LOT of miscommunication. However, the abundance of love between family members, between children and between my significant other and myself was unwavering. We were able and willing to talk through every stage of the ugly moments and my husband and I had incredibly hot sex to boot. How could I wish for more?
The best part of the holiday season was the rock and roll that has caught fire in my home, with my two sons now playing, researching and listening to the Beatles and The Who and even Meatloaf with a burning passion that keeps me reaching back to seventh, eighth, fourth grade, summer camp and first boyfriends, a lighter time, a time when music meant so much and a song was a vehicle of transportation.
Driving to pick up their cousins in really slippery conditions today, we were listening to the Who in the car, singing all the words, stuttering during "My Generation." As bad as I felt about everything that had gone wrong, I was reminded, by the rock and roll, that things are never, ever perfect, that they never will be, and the raw emotion of trying and failing and trying again is the fabric of our human journey anyway.
I love my family and I plan, next year, on showing them with a guitar lick and a microphone, a hug and a phone call and leaving the twirling and the hair spray for the seven-year-olds. Who are You?
Aimee Boyle is a freelance writer and teacher on the shoreline of CT.