Every year, I don’t dream of a white Christmas as much as I dream of any Christmas. White, black, whatever…any kind of Christmas would do just fine.
Even though I’ve come close a few times, it seems as though celebrating a “traditional” Christmas just isn’t in the greeting cards for me and, as I quickly approach death, probably never will be. There’s no opening presents, sitting down to a holiday dinner or, perhaps most damning, being surrounded by people who love you, even if it’s just on that one specific day.
Everybody’s got their own thing and there’s no room at the inn for me to be part of it.
This has been the mostly maudlin Dickensian story of my miserable holiday special of a life, from growing up poor and listening to the kids talk about the cool new toys they unwrapped that blessed morning to, almost four decades later, hearing my social circle discuss all of the festive plans they have going on over the next few days of mirth and merriment.
Meanwhile, I’m at home huddled over a spark-sputtering space heater, noshing on cold ranch-style beans out of the can, re-bingeing episodes of This is Us and deciding how many muscle relaxers at one too many and even if it is too many, who would care anyway. Oh, and have you heard the new Morrissey album yet? I have. Many times.