When I was younger, I loved Christmas. It was my second favorite holiday (Halloween being the first), and I looked forward to the holiday season every year starting with Halloween.

The reason Christmas was so magical for me, the same reason it is for most kids, is that my parents made it magical. They decorated the house beautifully, and made it festive throughout the season. They hosted Thanksgiving with delicious food, and our tradition was to put up the Christmas tree and start decorating the house the day after Thanksgiving. We had candle lights in every window, to make sure Santa Claus would find our house, and I got excited to turn them on every night, just like my siblings. My brother, sister, and I would take turns (sometimes fighting) over who got to move the little mouse in our Advent calendar every day, counting down the days til Christmas.

My parents (mostly my mother, as it usually is) went all out on Christmas mornings. I held onto the belief that there was a real Santa Claus for as long as I could; I think I knew, in the back of my mind around age 7 or 8, that it couldn’t possibly be true. The apartment we lived in until I was 9 didn’t have a fireplace, so how could Santa get inside?

Having younger siblings helped me keep up the façade, since having children around you will always aid in believing in magic. But it was still fun, even when all three of us gave in and admitted we knew there was no such thing as Santa, and that it had been Mum and Dad all along.

Christmas began to lose its magic when I reached my mid-twenties, and I spent my first Christmas away from home in the apartment I rented with my boyfriend. We had just moved in together, and for our first Christmas, he got me a 3-foot bong.... A gift that was for him, not me. I felt very much like Marge on The Simpsons when Homer bought her a bowling ball, with his name on it.

I couldn’t tell my parents what he really bought me for Christmas, but of course, they wanted to know what my boyfriend got me, and I made something up. I think I said he got me a bunch of CDs or DVDs or something. But the fight we got into after that definitely made its mark, as he did much better for Christmases after. We even spent the night at my parents’ house on Christmas Eve a couple of times during our relationship, which eventually turned into a marriage that didn’t last.

My sister moved south and my brother followed soon after, and my parents flew down every year to spend Christmas with their grandchildren. The first Christmas I spent alone was the year after my husband and I divorced. And I didn’t mind it at all. I slept in, something I never got to do as a kid since my brother always woke us up at the crack of dawn. I ate delicious carbs and sweets and got drunk on wine watching holiday movies. I had fun opening the presents my mother stockpiled for me before flying south.

Over the next few years, I would occasionally spend this holiday alone. After my parents retired, they moved south and now live around the corner from my sister and not far from my brother. I’ve flown south a few times myself and it’s always nice to see my nieces and nephews; though now that they’ve grown older, they seem a bit less interested in hanging out with their auntie, and that’s okay.

Christmas is, in so many ways, a kid’s holiday, and once you lose the magic of being a child, Christmas can lose its magic, too.

Last Christmas was the worst one of my life. I flew down south, and was so excited to see my family. But the mood in the car when they picked me up was somber, and I couldn’t figure out why. Once we reached my sister’s house, my mother gave me the terrible news that my cousin Brian, only 47 years old, was found dead in his apartment. He was post-double-bypass, and the physician suspected it was a clot that took him.
I felt the world drop underneath me when she told me he died. I crumpled to a ball on the floor in tears, but didn’t want to upset my niece and locked myself into the bathroom, and took a shower, trying to wash the guilt away.

The guilt I felt over not checking in on him more, not calling or texting him more, not telling him enough how much I loved him, and how important he was to me. Why do we never appreciate something we have until it’s gone?

Grief is one of the worst emotions to deal with because it’s so unpredictable. The up and down feelings, the desperate need to go back to feeling like you felt before the terrible news and everything changed. We not only grieve the person we lost, but we grieve the person we were before this. Because I am not the same. There’s this austere seriousness in me that wasn’t there before December 22, 2024. Certain things that used to make me happy, silly, mundane things, just don’t do it for me anymore. The heavy feeling in my heart when it broke last year is still there, it’s just a bit dulled, easier to deal with every day.

So, this Christmas, I decided to stay put and lay low, not fly south and find myself getting triggered, reliving the darkest moment in my life when I stepped inside my sister’s kitchen and got the news about Brian. My family has been wonderful in understanding, and my mother and sister have shipped me a stockpile of gifts to open on Christmas.

I really do envy the people who love Christmas. I miss the magic it used to have—the kind that felt effortless and guaranteed.

But this year, I’m learning that it doesn’t have to look the same to still be meaningful. It can be quiet. It can be low-key. Maybe the magic comes back one day in a different form. Or maybe it doesn’t, and that’s okay, too. For now, I’m allowing myself to meet this Christmas where I am, not where I wish I were. And maybe that, in its own small way, is enough.

And maybe, just maybe, 2026 will be the greatest year of my life.