The Day After Christmas

99 years ago

When I was a kid and went Christmas shopping with my siblings and our mother (who ran everything) it was always a difficult chore, especially since we rarely had more than ten bucks to spend buying gifts for everyone. But what made it even more difficult was that we always had to buy two gifts for our father. That is because his birthday was on the day after Christmas.

I always felt sorry for my father that his birthday fell on the day after Christmas. I mean how anticlimactic is that? So as a kid buying two presents for my dad I always made sure that the better of the two presents was for his birthday and the lesser of the two presents was for Christmas. I truly loved my father and this was a teeny tiny microscopic way of showing that love.

Most all historical evidence shows that Jesus was not really born on December 25th. But my father’s mother was. Her birthday was on Christmas Day so I imagine it was always overshadowed by Christmas. My father was due to be born on Christmas Day and to his mother I’m sure this would have been the very ultimate Christmas present. But he held out until after midnight and was born on the day after Christmas. I always thought these two days must be the two worst days to have a birthday.

My paternal grandmother died when I was still in elementary school. I only met her a few times and we never had an actual conversation — probably because she didn’t speak English. After coming through Ellis Island she lived in America for over half a century and she never bothered to learn to speak English, despite the fact that all of her children spoke nothing but English (except when they were talking to her). I never understood that.

Anyway, getting back to my father, we kids were instructed by our mother (the boss of the family) to never, ever, ever mention the fact that our father’s birthday happened to land on Boxing Day. My father was an athlete and he excelled at numerous sports but there were two sports that he absolutely loathed; boxing and wrestling. Like me, my father was a pacifist.

So as a kid I never connected my father’s day-after-Christmas birthday with Boxing Day or, for that matter, with Christmas. On my father’s birthday Christmas was officially over and in the past. A whole new year began leading up to the next Christmas and the beginning of that year was my father’s birthday. And that is how I was conditioned to see it.

At the age of 18 I left home for college. That is when I completely stopped celebrating Christmas. I was separating from my family and I was separating from Christmas. I no longer bought any Christmas presents and I no longer sent any Christmas cards. I refused to have anything to do with Christmas. I had some delightful Christmas memories and I also had some horrible Christmas memories but I shoved all that into the past and wiped the slate clean.

But I never stopped celebrating my father’s birthday!

It was a few years after I left home that my father kicked the bucket. At the time I was busy hitchhiking across America and none of my relatives had any idea how to get in contact with me. (What an awesome feeling that was!) It was several months later that I officially learned of my father’s passing. Of course, at a deep level I already knew that he had passed. I had a dream in which he appeared to me to tell me that he was “getting the hell out.” I recorded the dream in the journal that I kept at that time. Looking back over the journal I realized that the dream occurred on the very day that he died.

Of course my mother was extremely pissed that I never showed up for the funeral.

So for over a decade I never celebrated Christmas — not even in the teeniest, tiniest way. Even though I never celebrated Christmas I still always thought about my father on the day after Christmas.

And then one year I made love to a beautiful woman for the first time on the day after Christmas — my father’s birthday. Little did I know that that day would become our anniversary. Little did I know that that woman would become my wife. Little did I know that one day we would eventually have a wondrous child.

After over a decade of never, ever celebrating Christmas I suddenly morphed into a Christmas maniac. I started celebrating Christmas with a zeal and intensity that I never celebrated Christmas with before. I climbed up onto second-story roofs to hang Christmas lights, for crying out loud. I maxed out the credit cards to buy gifts. I decorated inside and outside. I baked Christmas cookies and Christmas meals. I sent everyone I knew Christmas cards. I even played Christmas music!

All because of a little girl!

Christmas suddenly changed…

… when I became a father.

17+ years later when the family broke up and everyone went their separate ways was when I stopped celebrating Christmas again and I haven’t celebrated it since. Well, except for the 3 presents I buy each year; one each for my granddaughters and one for my daughter. And I have not received a Christmas present myself in four years. (Oddly, that last Christmas present came from my ex-wife. I can’t believe she sent it through the mail.)

So for the last fifteen years or so I have not celebrated Christmas. I try not to even think about it. But for the last few days I’ve been thinking about Christmas and I joyfully blame Ann Litts . To my surprise I can hardly even remember all the negative crap. All I remember is the love and joy and merriment.

Because of Ann Litts I did some mental math (not my forte). I calculated that if my father was still alive that this year on the day after Christmas he will have turned 99 years old — older than George H. Dubya. But he never lived as long as George H. Dubya. My father kicked the bucket almost four decades ago.

Although I haven’t always celebrated Christmas…

… I have always celebrated the day after Christmas.

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