Blog Free Maine

You can’t have Christmas just by going through the motions. You have to put your heart into it. My heart is broken, so lately I have struggled with Christmas. It’s not broken in the figurative, literary sense. Not in that allegorical, poetic way that teenage lovers think is real. Nope it’s broken because a lot of the muscle has died and the electrical part doesn’t work right either. I’ll be more specific in future posts, but all you need to know for now is my ticker would have trouble sustaining a minature chihuahua whose diet includes large quantities of qualudes.

The Christmases I remember most fondly have been filled with love, joy, gathered loved ones, friends, and those few people you tolerate because you know they don’t have anywhere else to go.  There was always fun and games and the best Christmases always focused on the children.

It started when I was a child and Christmas and Santa Clause were still magical and real.  I overflowed with Christmas cheer.  Then as I got older and the truth came out Christmas lost its sparkle.  I still enjoyed Christmas, but it wasn’t magical anymore.  It was temporarily saved when I fell in love with my future wife.  Christmas was now an allegorical poetic love fest and I was enjoying my first holiday teen age loving like there was no tomorrow.  Thank God my wife doesn’t read my worthless musings.  it makes it so I can be as honost as my memmory lets me.

Even with the added sexual enjoyment Christmas eventually began to lose its luster again.    The lost Christmas magic and our maturing past the poetic love fest stage of our relationship meant Christmas was no longer taking place in a winter wonderland.

Then I experienced Christmas savior #1.  Our children.  Nothing brought me Christmas joy like sharing Christmas with my children.  Again the innocence was there, the magic was back, and the Christmas cheer overflowed.  I loved Christmas more than ever.  Then my children did something children shouldn’t be allowed to do.  They grew up and with that the innocence was lost, the magic faded, and my Christmas cheer began ebbing.

So many years have passed with me enjoying Christmas only slightly more then I was tolerating it.  Until another miracl came and I had Christmas savior #2.   Grandchildren.  A granddaughter and a grandson.  They are beautiful, beliving.  Santa is real and the magic is back.  Christmas cheer once again overflows.

Here, though, is where that sick heart comes in.  Just when the magic is back and I can see it through my granchildren’s eyes, the best spectrum ever to see Christmas through, the most magic of all Christmases, I am struggling with my lack of strength.  Their energetic embracement of Christmas and all things Santa Clause is possibly the most wonderful thing I have witnessed in my life, yet I barley have the strength to share it.  I worry that my tepid demeanor from lack of oxygen and painful neuropothy will steal some Christmas joy from the two precious children I so love.  There is guilt in the fact that I can’t take a wintery Christmas walk with them.. I have shame that I don’t have the strength to take up my son and his wife’s offer to take care of them and to give them that special bond that only a grandparent can give.

I am trying to convince myself that I am offering them as much as I can and that they are getting more from me than some children get from their grandparents, but there’s no solace in that.  I constantly question myself to see if I am giving those children and the rest of my life all that I can.  I never know the answer to that question.  How do you answer the question, “How bad do I really feel.”?  Compared to what or who.  Could I be doing better, should I be doing better?

What would have happened if I had or had not done this or that?  How can I let them down like this?  My diseases are the hidden kind.  No one could look at me and say boy he is sick.  I do get, “You look tired.”, a lot, but that’s about it.  My heart disease that I was born with and now the neuropathy from medicine complications along with a few other ailments don’t have recognizable faces.  You couldn’t tell it by looking at me unless I was having a real bad day.

So I waste time worrying if my grandkids ever will know how much I love them.  If they’ll ever know that I would do anything for them if I just could.  I’m told that over 50% of heart patients develope depression and I understand why.  Please share any of your burdens that weigh heavily on you with me if you can.  My hope is to find a ray of inspiration.  I am always looking for that ray of inspiration.