My children were determined to get their parents back into their home for Christmas. Their effort was Herculean, all-hands-on-deck, cleaning, moving boxes, transporting furniture from storage, more boxes from the place where we had been staying, and finally, late in the day, Ed’s chair and Ed back into our house. December 22.
We had scheduled gift giving for the 24th, since our paramedic son-in-law was working on Christmas day, so with two days to go, I finished my shopping and bought the groceries for Christmas dinner.
On Christmas Eve day the kids brought our fake tree and decorated it. Around 4, our son came and finished up a few chores he had left to accomplish. Our daughter brought glute-free food for Doug.
I made two lasagnas, Robyn and Renee brought a lovely salad, we had bottles of Prosecco, apple pie with vanilla ice cream and decided to open gifts while the food cooked.
One or two presents in, Ed, who had been fading noticeably, announced he needed to go to bed, so the “boys” helped him into the bedroom. We continued with the gifts, and then with dinner. Doug checked on Ed multiple times, finally announcing that if his father-in-law was his patient, he’d be taking him to the hospital. So, men in uniform came with a folding stretcher, and off they went. I was advised to stay home.
In time, I got the verdict: he had Covid and a touch of pneumonia.
I, in the meantime, thought I had caught a cold, so the next morning I used my last Covid test and found out that I, too, tested positive.
And that’s how we spent Christmas.
There’s more to the story, but I’m not ready to tell it yet.
Give me a minute.

A tree fell on my house in the woods. When you live in the woods, that can be expected, I suppose, especially when a hurricane passes through on it’s way to perform truly news-worthy damage in places farther north. Helene was the storm’s name, and it showed up in north-central Florida on September 26. Some friends had visitedisi immediately prior to that date. They left and headed north a few days before Helene, or they would have been sleeping in the room that was destroyed.

The next day we left our house with a tree in it and moved a half an hour south and into a lovely home that our daughter-in-law’s mother vacated to accomodate us. Neither of us could at that time imagine how long our displacement would take place, but here we are coming up on the 27th of December soon, which means three months.

In that time, I have been back and forth to my place gathering “essentials”–in other words things and stuff that made me feel less like a visitor here. First I gathered the valuables we wouldn’t want anyone to steal, then gradually I got my favorite kitchen accessories, more clothes than I needed, miscellaneous “gotta have that’ items. Added to the food I bought while here–there was a Publix five minutes away–we’re swamped and I’m feeling really silly. Friends who will help us move will be stunned. It feels like I have more here than there. Can’t be, right?

What I don’t have is my Christmas tree, my antique country Santas, my gathered-over-a-lifetime knick knacks that every year I swear I won’t drag out and every year I do. My five thousand lights. It’s probably the first year of my entire eighty-four years that my abode is bare of any decorations. But then, nothing about this time right now feels normal, so why not this? I did go shopping today. It’s December 20. That’s the latest I’ve ever “started” shopping, and I’m oddly relaxed. When a tree falls on your house forcing you to move out for three months, it’s funny how trivial buying presents can feel.

I’m sure everything will be fine. We’ll get moved, We’ll settle in. The cows next door will comfort me with their familiar lowing. The dark will be the darkest ever, the quiet will calm me, My porch beckons.

Whatever happens, it will be good to be home.