More recent memories....

After graduating from high school, I entered a business college in a city about two hours’ drive from my small town. At first, I roomed in the local YWCA – my mother, somehow, found money to pay for my room (by the week) and give me some extra for food. If I were careful, I could make it last until my next allowance. (I have no idea how she did this – she was a miracle worker!) I was able to find a part time job to help out around Christmas time. Another source of income was when we volunteered to be guinea pigs for the local Menninger Foundation – taking part in whatever study they happened to be doing at the moment. Once volunteered for a project, we couldn’t volunteer again until they started a new project, so these opportunities were few and far between. The college provided leads and contacts for jobs after graduation. Most of us who really needed jobs were able to find them – some went on to take civil service tests and work for the government, others found jobs in the private sector. I found an administrative job for the state at the local state mental institution . I changed jobs a few times, rooming with other girls I had gone to college with to make ends meet. Then I met a guy – we got married – and we moved halfway across the country. Up to this point I had been able to go home every Christmas – not so any longer. We made a trip back home for the holidays about once every five years (we still didn’t have much money) and within the first six years of our marriage we had our two sons. I would decorate like a mad person and I can’t believe how organized I was! Since I had to mail packages back home, I shopped early, mailed over the Thanksgiving Holiday, got my cards addressed and mailed by the first week in December, and was able to sit back and just do things for the kids. Sounds like it should have been a good time....and if it weren’t for my husband, it might have been so. I never heard the stories about how he was raised or what made him so unhappy and sad about the holidays, but his somber mood was catching. By the time the holiday actually rolled around, I couldn’t wait to rip down the decorations and pack everything away out of sight until the next year when I had to do it all over again. I’m not sure, but I don’t think the children were observant of his behavior – to this day, I haven’t heard either of them say anything about it.

As things happen, one year a couple of months before the holidays, we split. Over the years, he became indifferent, said he needed his social life – meaning hanging around the bars downtown and only coming home when they closed and there was nowhere else to go. I was the one who did the housework, the yardwork, the bill paying, the grocery shopping, the chauffering – you name it. I once read an article in Dear Abby or Ann Landers, don’t remember which, that was right on – if you and your husband become emotionally separated, pretend you are a widow and go on and live your own life as though he were no longer around. I did this. Somehow, I was able to enroll in the community college and take classes while at the same time becoming a Den Mother for my son’s cub scout pack and attending the Scout Council meetings. I went to the PTA meetings and class plays. I planned each weekend to take the boys and their friends somewhere – one of the Civil War battlefields, hiking in the Appalachians, playing in a creek we found that had some awesome waterfalls and rocks to slide on, camping at the lake, to the park, library and movies. All the time I held down a fulltime job. The more I planned activities for the three of us, the less dependent I became on him. Finally, I knew that I could be independent, that I could function on my own, that I could stand on my own two feet! Good thing too – because he finally dropped the bomb and told me to move out of the house! I was fortunate and found a studio apartment created out of an attic space within a couple of weeks. All I took were my clothes. He kept the kids.

The boys came to visit me each Christmas, so I made an effort to decorate this one-room space for the holidays and cook a real holiday dinner just like I always did. They were always quiet affairs, and we all knew we’d never be a family of four again.

As time went on, my jobs changed a couple of more times, I landed a job with more potential and a lot more pay and benefits. I was able to rent a real apartment! My ex by this time had found another woman, had paid for the divorce (since I wouldn’t pay for it because I had no intention of ever remarrying) and gotten married. He also moved to another area and the boys didn’t want to move with him so they were able now to move back in with me. The three of us were a family again and I became a fulltime mother again, not just one for the holidays but for all year around!

Three years’ ago my oldest son died of a head injury from a fall. My youngest son has bought his own house and has a significant other. The holidays have once again become lonely and sad. I have company, I go places, I look at the lights, listen to the music...but it hasn’t been the same; when you lose someone so close for forever, especially your child, things can never be the same.