Christmas Mourning

The best Christmas selfie of the 2013 season

I've been waiting for this moment for a long time. The moment I freaking flip out internally over what I have to face this week; tomorrow. Tonight I was leaving work, and I decided to briefly stop in the Bath & Body Works across from my office. As I was standing in line to pay, I started panicking. My breathing quickened. I got that push, that pressure, behind my eyes. I wanted to cry, but I held it together. I don't know if it was the fact that I was surrounded by upbeat, happy people who are expecting a warm and fuzzy holiday. I really don't know what drove the feeling. But it continued as I walked to my car and on my drive home.

For the first time in my life, I'm not exactly looking forward to Christmas. I'm not dreading it either, but I simply do not feel the spirit. Christmas used to be my favorite time of the year, but now I'm kind of numbed by my loss. I've tried really hard to feel it. I've decorated, I've baked cookies (actually when I baked cookies I jammed angrily to Led Zeppelin), I've listened to the appropriate music, watched the right movies. But I've realized I'm just going through the motions. Don't get me wrong, I am so excited to give to my family and be with them, but it's the loss that hurts so much. My grandfather had this amazing way of making me feel like I belonged, and now I have this fear that I will never feel that way again. Again, my family is fantastic. Especially my Mamaw, and I really hope that for the sake of us both that I can make this holiday really special. But Papaw had this indescribable way of making us feel loved. It had nothing to do with presents and all to do with presence.

I've always been that girl- the one who loves Christmas for the warm and fuzzies. Sitting by a Christmas tree at night, laughing with family is essential. The atmosphere has always been what I rave about. I love the crispness of the air. I love the lights, and I love the sounds; however, this Christmas, the music has been like nails on a chalkboard. I can handle Paul McCartney and Chuck Barry, but anything else makes me want to impale myself with a candy cane.

I'm so over the food. Food has been an awful struggle in the wake of Papaw's death. I have a hard time being hungry, and I rarely crave anything. In fact, I'm so over the food, that I'd like to take a pumpkin pie into the back alley and beat the hell out of it with a baseball bat. Yeah I said it.

I have every right to feel this way. I've always said that I don't care what I have, as long as those I love are with me on that day. But they won't be. And it sucks. So it's perfectly okay that I feel violent toward pumpkin pie.

Grief is a big b*tch. And she doesn't stop for the holidays.