In the South, Christmas is about ghosts.
My Grandmother raised me to recognize the spiritual places we build upon and how to pay tribute. Telling stories of her Grandfather playing the fiddle for them, or her Great-Grandmother and her pet raven providing companionship while she waited for her husband to return from sea. And they still live there, in that land my family has held for generations. If you don't acknowledge these spirits- Cirraldine, Edward, Adolph, Emily, Silver Lee (YES that one)- you dishonor your family and are an outcast of sorts.
Twice while breaking ground in an attempt to build a new home (My Grandma is 'Southern Money'), construction had to be haulted due to the discovery of Native American or Confederate Graves. Down by Sugar Creek I remember seeing the dilapidated body of a casket, long since robbed, tumbling out of the earth. I was scared, but Grandma told me to approach it and not be scared. Men who gave their lives protecting their native land by leaving for field or sea.
Candles glowing in the windowsill of my room in Arkansas watching the snow fall past the dogwood trees is a memory that still brings me to tears. I have not been home to pay tribute to these spirits since 2007. I can feel that part of me slipping away, and it leaves a hollow pit of mourning.
Living up here in the Pacific Northwest, you'd imagine there is plenty of spirit on the coast and in the mountains, but I live in the desert. Shrub steppe, sagebrush, mustard grass, dust, and tumble weeds. And to my family here, Christmas is just another day off. My heart gets broken every year.
So I constantly torture myself my reading or watching the film based off of my favorite book. The movie is a sweet love story with some sadness and loss, but the book has multiple soul-destroying tragedies. My Gramma said that the ghosts at home still feel the pain, but the pride of them makes them a macabre comfort to her. I think this skips a generation. My mother is a conservative Christian, my Gramma is quite open-minded but goes to a Baptist Church, and I am torn between faith in never-ending residual energy vs. the impossibilities brought on by the never-failing comforts of physical science. But, I admit, those connections with spirits are slipping away, and the palpable sensation of my soul dying has put me in agony again.
The purpose of this isn't just to get my emotions out by words, but I hope it makes you look back to what this season means to you, and to never let that fade. Fight tooth and nail for your past happiness, because it will never fail you.
Merry Christmas, my friends and crushes :kiss
Ekkk, love the preview! 