When the Holidays are Hard

Sometimes the holidays are hard. Every year, in a household somewhere, there is someone who isn’t there for the first time—or, someone who isn’t there for the tenth time, who is still missed.

The feeling of isolation that goes with sorrow and loss can be unbearable. Sometimes, knowing that someone else has traveled that same road can help relieve a little of the loneliness.

If this is such a holiday for you—if there is someone missing, and your celebration is dark at the edges with grief—I have this to offer. It is my Grandma Mamie’s diary of Thanksgiving Day, 1958—the first Thanksgiving without her mother, who had passed away just five months earlier.

Thanksgiving Day—November 27, 1958

We had turkey from the freezer, giblet gravy, corn bread stuffing, cranberry sauce, relish and olives, besides the pies. There were just the four of us. Helen was having in friends, while Charles was going hunting and wanted no set meals.

This was the worst day I have had since mother left us, just five months ago. I was no good to anyone. I thought of Thanksgiving days of yesteryears, and how proud Dad was of a groaning table. One of his favorite meat platters consisted of a large baked hen on a huge plate, surrounded by several baked and stuffed quail. He used to say it looked like a hen and her chicks.

He was proud of his hunting prowess, and mother’s wonderful hand with the preparations. She could make the best food a family was ever privileged to eat. I thought of my little brother, who had only six Thanksgiving Days with us, but always asked for the “bonestick”. And I thought of my sister Mildred, who dearly loved the family gatherings and the excellent food.

Four of us are gone now, with only three remaining. It made a sad somber holiday for me.

Mamie Morrison Boone, personal diary

Grandma Mamie lived all of her life in one county, most of it in one town.  She never had a driver’s license.  Each loss made the home fire tapestry a much more empty picture.  But if we keenly feel the loss of something, then it is also true that we have held something worth losing. As Anthony Hopkins (playing theologian and author C.S. Lewis) said in the film, Shadowlands:

Why love if losing hurts so much? I have no answers any more. Only the life I have lived.  Twice in that life I’ve been given the choice: as a boy and as a man. The boy chose safety, the man chooses suffering.  The pain now is part of the happiness then.  That’s the deal.

Those who love, and lose, were blessed by life’s best gift.  To love and be loved, even if for a moment, colors life in all of its glory.  Everyone who hugged you back gave that moment hope and faith in the future. 

If your day has pain, if you see the empty chair and feel your heart drop, know that you have possessed the one eternal gift: the gift of loving and being loved.  And you and I will remember love and be thankful.