I still don’t know if I am going to put up even a fraction of the massive amount of XMas decorations I have…

Lynn came into our relationship with bins and bins of XMas decorations, a set and a half of a Dept 56 XMas Village, and all the Santa themed items under the sun. (Apparently when she was young, she mentioned she loved Santa decor, so her friends and family for DECADES gifted her with Santa themed everything, lol) Over our years together, we collected our own massive share of XMas decorations, including Santa punch bowls, a singing and dancing Snoopy doll, and outfits for our dogs, of course. In the 11 years since she has passed, there have been a very small handful of years when I had the energy or interest to put up the space-consuming Xmas Villag, or put up a tree to hold numerous sentimental ornaments. (I always had the doggos wear the outfits though.) 

A month or so before she passed, Lynn had hung several strands of lights under our porch. I kept them there, and at the very least, I would turn them on so it gave the appearance that i had done “something” regarding XMas decor. When I had my house painted 2 years ago, I had to take the lights down – which actually was not as traumatic as I thought it would be. My home is a 1951 house with a front porch, and is now painted white with a light teal trim. In keeping with the mid-century theme, for the past two XMas’, I have put up a a short, multi-pastel-colored tree, and put in a rotating colors porch light. Done, good enough. No decorating was done inside.

For years after she passed, I felt a bit obligated to decorate – to put up our XMas memories, to display HER momentos and the stories only I knew – the cups her grandma gave her, the ornament her brother made her when he was 4 years old, etc. And it was bittersweet – I felt joy seeing and displaying the items,  and I felt like a “good widow” doing my duty for my partner. But of course, it felt sad that she was not the one smiling and remembering the family stories, and it was sad that only I (at least here in the physical world) was seeing these items every day. Over the years, the feeling of obligation has organically gone away (for the most part), and now I feel a desire to see some of the decorations in order to remember MY own beautiful stories and past. Some of my ornaments are SO special, that they are stored in a fancy ornament box, and placed in the “take-in-case-of-a-fire” cabinet. As I am typing this and imagining taking these ornaments out, I realize that I would definitely feel grief and loss. Anticipating feeling grief and sadness is NOT a reason to avoid taking out the ornaments and decorations, of course, but it reminds me to set aside time during and after to potentially have some tears. 

This year, I definitely don’t have the energy to put up decor in the home, even though I would actually love to be surrounded by it. Also, I will be out of the country visiting family the last two weeks of December. Yesterday, I looked under my porch, and happily realized the painters had left up the hooks for lights! So, I put up a very long lighted wreath (bought at Goodwill), that perfectly spanned the length of my porch! Score! It is enough for me to feel like a contributing member to my neighborhood. It also makes it feel like a new type of XMas decorating, and has put me in a headspace of, how does current me want to decorate for the holidays? (I have been really obsessed with the YouTube videos of peoples’ retro Xmas decorated home tours…)