"Merry" Christmas

 I don’t like Christmas. I don’t use the word hate only because I’m working hard to make hate a thing of my past so I will avoid that...inclination. It’s 4:30 in the morning and I cannot sleep like a child who’s too excited to sleep on Christmas morning. The difference is that I’m not stressing about what’s in my stocking. Instead, I’m stressing about what’s in my mind, having to deal with family and phone calls all day. My family, who keeps me on the periphery of their lives will expect me to drop my life because they decided to honour me with a dash of caring and communication. 

This time of year reminds me just how little I mean to almost everyone in my life. I am the pity uncle, the one who you invite to special occasions due to familial obligations rather than actual caring. In 8 days when it’s my 47th birthday I will once again be reminded just how little I matter. This year, everyone will even have an excuse for treating me that way due to the forced isolation from the COVID pandemic. My birthday will once again be spent alone but this year no one will have to reach out at all if they don’t want to and won’t feel any guilt whatsoever, assuming that they ever do. My birthday will float by like a piece of flotsam, ignored and then forgotten.

This isn’t me overreacting for a change. Instead, this is an expectation I have had to learn to accept over the last 35 years. I will get facebook messages from Anthony, Tricia, Debbie and my sister. My brother may bother to mention it. My nieces and nephew will ignore it, as will the remainder of my friends. My birthday will fly by once again and if I’m lucky, I will spend a portion of it at Starbucks where I will get my free coffee and a chance to be alone and away from my mother who won’t even bother to ask if there’s anything special I want for dinner. 

When I was growing up, the twelve days of Christmas started, for me, on December 24th and lasted until school would return. My birthday will have occurred during the Christmas break ignored by my friends and teachers. Birthday parties were rare, so rare that I remember my 5th birthday as the one that stands out. Other than that, no one has ever made my birthday a special thing. Throughout elementary and secondary school my birthday would pass by without a passing thought for most people in my life.

I hoped that things would change when I was older, especially after I turned 19 so that I could go out and enjoy my birthday. My 19th birthday told me how wrong I was going to be as I was turning legal before all of my friends so no one could go out with me. Now, looking back, I fail to see why my friends didn’t at least want me to buy some alcohol so we could all celebrate at my home but they all forgot it was even a special day for me. So instead I spent my 19th alone with a 6 pack of Coors Light, alone in my room. 

As my 20th neared there was one exception to so many years of being ignored. A couple of girls who used to come into my work invited me out to a New Years Eve party and I went. I was alone, knowing only them but one of them and I spent 15 minutes laying on the cold winter grass outside the house drinking beer and watching the northern lights. That year, my birthday came and went once again but at least my New Years had a happy memory. Little did I know that now, as an adult, December 31st would steal even more of people’s attention away from my birthday. By the time January 3rd came around, people were broke and emotionally spent. There was no time, money or energy left to help me celebrate my day. 

I worked my birthday most years from when I had been 15 to this point and no one at work made an effort either. No birthday cakes, no one suggesting we meet up for an after work drink, nothing. But at least at work I wasn’t alone at home wondering why I was so unimportant to everyone.

I spent my 23rd birthday on a bus, spending 16 hours moving to Calgary to be with Heather. It was exhausting but when I got there at least I knew I wouldn’t be alone for my birthday ever again, but I was wrong. The next year, having moved to northern Alberta for her first teaching job, Heather left Calgary the day before my birthday to avoid traffic. Once again, now in a city away from all of my lifelong friends, I spent my birthday alone, drinking to my self pity and playing a slot machine. That fall I moved back to Langley, now single and even more alone than ever.

It wasn’t until my 30th birthday that things changed a little. My new friend Anthony and a couple others went to the bar to celebrate. We danced, had some fun and I got to let loose for a change. It was like all of the past 25 years had built up to that night and then released. What I didn’t know was that it would be my last big night for my birthday until today. 

41 years now and I have exactly two happy and memorable birthdays and this year will make 42. Again, due to COVID I will be alone or at least I can tell myself it’s because of COVID. All my past experience tells me that I’d be alone whether or not the virus was holding our necks to the ground. 

So you’ll have to excuse me if I don’t find much to be grateful for again this year or reasons to expect a merry Christmas because all this time of year does is remind me that I am destined to be alone.