#86: Happy New Year.
It’s taken me nearly the whole day to sit down at my computer, but here I am ready to write. Ready to write during the final moments of the first day of the new year. Reader, Happy New Year, but I must be honest with you: I’m literally forcing myself to sit at the dining room table and manipulate these keys into the words you are currently reading. I can’t guarantee what you are about to read is my best, nor do I have the time to properly proof and edit them. I’ve got a twenty-five-minute timer running, so here goes. Reader, as I sit here and ponder at this late hour, only two thoughts are lighting up the dark areas of my membrane.
The First. With it being New Year’s Day, we saw some family today that we haven’t seen in a few months. The way my wife and I have chosen to divide the holidays between our respective sides didn’t allow us to see my grandmother. This year, she’ll be eighty-nine, and while we spoke on the phone here and there, it’s never the same as actually having her right in front of you.
Before I went to my aunt’s earlier this afternoon, I was warned by a few different people about the her current condition. Reader, I’m not going to lie to you, it wasn’t easy seeing her a little weaker and a more subdued than I’ve ever before. You see, my grandmother was always laughing and always interested in anything her grandchildren had to say. Her light would burn so bright, especially this time of year. Seeing her so inward, keeping to herself, was the most jarring for me.
But, Reader, my grandmother has always loved being around little kids, specifically her grandchildren, and I just so happen to have been carrying around her newest great-grandchild all afternoon. She spent a long time sitting off to the side, but when I sat down next to her with my six-month old son on my lap, I could see the life come back to her. She perked up a bit and faced him. She smiled her usual smile and started talking to him. The light she always gave off wasn’t completely gone. Despite everything, it’s still in her, and my son was able to access it.
The Second. As soon as winter break began, I started reading A Boy Named Christmas by Matt Haig. Reader, that name might sound familiar to you; Matt Haig is the author of the New York Times and International bestselling novel The Midnight Library. (Reader, The Midnight Library was the basis of a much earlier post.) Unlike his more famous work, A Boy Named Christmas is a middle-grade novel that provides an origin story of sorts for Father Christmas/Santa Claus. It’s cute and quite clever of a story, and I highly recommend it for the 10–13-year-olds in your life. While lighthearted, there was one quote near the end that cut much deeper, and I took to the time to write it down in my notebook:
“The lands below were all dark but with brief Burts of light from all the fires and gas streetlamps that glimmered in the cities below. As Father Christmas finally asked Blitzen to head home, he thought of all human life - and certainly the life he remembers - was like this landscape. Dark with occasional burst of light.”
Haig’s character is noticing how people aren’t all good or all bad. Both the darkness and the light, or in this context goodness, live inside each of us, and Father Christmas, in the story, is trying to find a way to focus on the light we each possess. You know, in the past, I’ve made attempts at more solidified New Year’s resolutions, some of which I’ve stuck to, but, this year, Reader, and with my timer about to expire, all I want to do in 2024 is focus on the light inside of people. I’m starting that today.
And with that, I’m starting to realize that these two thoughts aren’t as different as I initially perceived when I first sat down to type. Instead of seeing the darkness or the ailments that pains my grandmother, I’m going to focus on the light that she exuded when she looked at my son and clasped his little feet in his hands.
Thanks for reading, and Happy New Year!
…And please forgive me for any typos and grammatical mistakes. I’ll do better next time!