There’s room.
Honestly.
There’s room.
There’s room
for the uncle
that loves the gawdy decorations
and the kids running cut-out paper snowflakes along every banister,
and the teenager who is embarrassed to admit they still want to decorate the tree.
So, the cool aunt with the buzz-cut
whose wife is just as cool
inviting them to help out
is just the ticket.
There’s room for deep inhales and longer exhales,
because the spicy smell of apple pie in the oven reminds you
of mom.
And that is wonderful
and lonely
and triggering.
Because mom was complicated. And there’s room for that. Honestly.
There’s room.
There’s room
for Hanukkah candles burning in window sills
and for the cookie platter
supplied to the shift workers for whom Christmas day
is just another shift.
There’s room
For family – all sorts.
For re-uniting family:
perhaps dysfunctional but trying.
For found family:
perhaps that crew of queers who can’t go home anymore. So, they say to each other,
“There is still pumpkin pie on the menu!”
For grieving family:
Perhaps rotating cigarette breaks on the steps to the hospital, when the walls of the palliative room are closing in.
And there’s room for the words,
“I hate Christmas,”
because why does everyone die in December?
There’s room.
Honestly.
There’s room.
There’s room
for putting up the tree
the day after Halloween and leaving it
till spring.
There’s room
in the Christmas eve service
for everyone.
So church, remember that.
And there’s room
for the person that can’t darken a pew.
Afterall,
The Christ child grew into person
who had a thing or two to say about
the religious establishment’s treatment
of “the least of these.”
There’s room
for loneliness.
You are not alone in this.
There’s room
to forgive
and for not knowing how to yet.
There’s room
for the same stories told over and over:
of babes and misers and angels and red-nosed reindeer, and prophetic stars and lassoing the moon,
and poor, ordinary, occupied people...
waiting.
There’s room for mulled wine and chocolate and
Those caramel covered marshmallow things.
HONESTLY! THERE’S ROOM!
There’s room
at the table for the ones who never seem to fit. Maybe that’s you.
In which case,
there’s room for you –
along with the shepherds and stargazers
and unwed pregnant teenagers and dreamy carpenters and livestock:
all welcome when
there was no room
at the inn.
Because gathered round love
(humble and asking for nothing)
There’s room for you.
Honestly.
There’s room.
*
please do not publish, perform or distribute without permission from the author:
heids macdonald : heidsmacdonald@gmail.com
