I’ve been reading the ghost of Christmas past. No, not the Scrooge book. I’ve been reading my old diaries to see what it was I was doing this time last year, and the year before that, and the year before that. Had I not thrown them away in a stupor, I could be reading all the way back to Christmas 1998 (but I shutter to think!) I was trying to find the exact details of that last Christmas before I met my husband. Why? Because I remember how sad it was and I hoped to, idk count my blessings or see if my cognition was correct. Maybe I wanted to remember how I dealt with it all, felt about it all. I have some thoughts to share with that little girl. She was so sad that Christmas because she was missing the traditions and memories of what previous years had been. She had no idea the following Christmas would be a magical one of her choosing. She was unaware that five years later, she’d be up at 3AM wrapping gifts for her little boy and messaging Amazon to refund her because the customer jersey she ordered for her husband is somewhere on the ocean undelivered. (Sorry, I’m on a tangent!) If anything, I’d tell Paula circa 2018 who is sitting at the kitchen table of her roach invested home that she shared with two coked up white guys while sobbing over a pan of mac-n-cheese that you will in fact surprise yourself! It will be glorious, love!

As far as Christmas traditions go, I like to buy the can of popcorn from Walmart and later use it like a storage tin or bathroom trashcan. That’s about it. Last year, my tree was made of paper. This year, it’s leaning like a tower of fake pine Pisa. Christmas dinner, I have no preference except I’d rather not have a Thanksgiving repeat. Gifts, I might buy or I might make if at all. Sometimes I might volunteer on Christmas day or I might binge watch movies (not holiday one’s though, fake Christmas magic ughs me). There’s a part of me that indulges in the holidays like an addict. I want to make memories. Other parts of me fear pushing & pushing to make the day special and feeling disappointed. The other-other parts of me know this is an awful tradition rooted in capitalism and patriarchy! I will not let my child think a fat white man is allowed to break into my house!

But no matter what I decide, I never want to go Paula circa 2018 again. It’s not the lonely part, I’ve survived loneliness and know I love myself enough to be with myself and be okay. It’s not the gross house- though in all honesty, the roaches weren’t the worst part but I never want to see that place again. I just never want to go back to a place where I am in need of something more than what I already got to be happy. Whether that means I’m always in abundance or my chakras are just better aligned, I don’t know. But I know what it feels to not be able to be enough for myself, no more of that.

So in the coming years, I hope to surprise myself by encountering the sadness that is inevitable and being fortified enough to whether the storm. I imagine it like a wave but I’m surf board ready or gust of wind but I’ve got on steel toe boots. I can’t control the weather but I can control how I react to it.

I’m feeling unhappy about the way my New Years Eve plans are shaping up. Putting on my boots now!