{"id":5856,"date":"2020-12-10T00:02:14","date_gmt":"2020-12-10T08:02:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/?p=5856"},"modified":"2020-12-10T00:02:14","modified_gmt":"2020-12-10T08:02:14","slug":"dolly-in-the-corner-revisited-victoria-bc-12-09-2020","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/?p=5856","title":{"rendered":"Dolly in the Corner Revisited \u2013 Victoria, BC \u2013 [12\/09\/2020]"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"\u201cI\u2019d rather have the dolly in the corner.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019d rather have the oranges\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

~ A Musical Scrooge<\/em><\/p>\n

I\u2019ve been doing a lot of thinking about Christmas this year. About what it means. About what it is<\/em>. About whether or not, deep down, it\u2019s actually important<\/em> or\u2026worth it in the midst of all this.<\/p>\n

And I think I have come to a very important conclusion within myself.<\/p>\n

The holidays this year? Are more important than they\u2019ve ever been before. I think I\u2019ve noticed this more being a shop girl this season than I would have were I\u2026not. Usually we don\u2019t start selling completely out of Christmas lights until midway through December, this season our shelves were starting to look bare a few weeks before December even started<\/em>. There\u2019s been an unprecedented rush on holiday sparkles\u2026because I think everyone needs something visibly, aggressively cheerful in their lives in the midst of all the terrible dark and fear.<\/p>\n

But the run on lights and the uptick in Christmas displays isn\u2019t exactly what I\u2019m trying to get at here\u2026<\/p>\n

I\u2019d be lying if I said that there wasn\u2019t a part of me that \u2026didn\u2019t want to bother this year at all. That was tempted to not do any of it, to just\u2026leave it all in boxes, put on a movie, buy some oranges and be done with it. After all, there\u2019s no big party, no big orphan\u2019s dinner, no outdoor skating rink, no caroling, no in person non-household gift exchanges. There\u2019s no\u2026trappings\u2026this year.<\/p>\n

And yet\u2026perhaps that\u2019s exactly why my heart told me \u201cno\u2026no, this year, this year is the<\/em> year to open yourself up to the important<\/em> stuff.\u201d<\/p>\n

Time, I realized\u2026to savour the oranges.<\/p>\n

Some years ago I wrote about the \u201cDolly in the Corner\u201d complex. The idea that the holidays have caused so many of us to be the \u2018littlest Cratchit\u2019 \u00a0with her nose pressed to the toy shop window, longing for the beautiful blonde doll winking at us from behind the glass. The big beautiful sparkling whatever-it-is that we ache to unwrap Christmas morning more than anything else. I recall saying that I have been very very<\/em> lucky in my life, and that my \u2018normal\u2019 line of work normally gives<\/em> us the Dolly In The Corner; but that perhaps we should all think about being a bit more like Tiny Tim\u2026who only wishes that his father would buy oranges instead of apples for Christmas Morning. And so \u2018oranges\u2019 have come to represent all intangible things that are really important\u2026<\/p>\n

And once I realized that, and caught hold of it\u2026I realized that I feel more like Christmas this season than I have since I was a child. Once you peel back all the layers of \u201cwe don\u2019t have\u201d, all the glitz and commercial glamour that we have been taught is so very important\u2026there has been something found<\/em> under all of it. Something really really<\/em> important.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s an old clich\u00e9 that the holidays aren\u2019t about what\u2019s under the tree, it\u2019s about who\u2019s around<\/em> the tree.<\/p>\n

I know that many of us don\u2019t have all the people around us that we wish we did. I know families are separated and loved ones far flung. I know this is hard<\/em>. But one thing that this whole mess has given me is a bone deep appreciation for the people that are<\/em> here. The dear ones I am<\/em> allowed to see. The things that I can<\/em> do.<\/p>\n

Sure, I can\u2019t go ice skating. I can\u2019t afford fancy dinners in or out, and I can\u2019t get everyone the zillions of gifts I would like. I can\u2019t audition for anything and I can\u2019t go see the nutcracker\u2026<\/p>\n

But I can<\/em> curl up in front of the fireplace with my husband and watch silly Christmas movies. We can sit and string popcorn to hang on our (comparatively) small tree, I can sit with my family and try and solve the world\u2019s problems over too many glasses of eggnog. I can blast Christmas carols in the kitchen and make overly large batches of sugar cookies. I can make glittering fairy lamps out of mason jars and battery driven mini-lights. I can still hang stockings even though there isn\u2019t a great deal to put in them. I can still smile at strangers even if it\u2019s from behind a goofy Christmas mask. I can make people presents and figure out if homemade freezer jam counts<\/em> as a present. I can light candles and take pictures and figure out how to sew one of those goofy Christmas masks for AJ.<\/p>\n

I can take a twilight walk with my husband, when the streets are almost empty and admire those same Christmas lights I probably sold earlier this week.<\/p>\n

I can still speak to those who are far away…even though they are further than I would wish.<\/p>\n

I can stop and think about all the people who have it worse than me, and how lucky I am to be where <\/em>\u00a0I am. I can be appreciative of the things that I can\u2019t <\/em>touch, but that can be encouraged around us every day, especially now. Human kindness, decency\u2026tolerance..<\/p>\n

And patience\u2026so so much patience.<\/p>\n

I know a few people who have given up on Christmas this year. For whatever reason, because the bells and whistles are gone, or more likely simply because they are tired \u2013 worn through by a year that has taken too much and given so little\u2026<\/p>\n

But the truth I have found for myself is this: This Christmas is a gift. You may have given up on the holidays, but they haven\u2019t given up on you. Christmas is that small still voice of giving in your heart that says \u201chere, here is the joy in the darkness. Here is some light\u2026if you will just see it\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

After all, as a wise fictional professor of magic once said: \u2018Happiness can be found in the most unlikely of places\u2026if one only remembers to turn on the light\u201d<\/p>\n

Please\u2026this holiday\u2026turn on the light\u2026<\/p>\n

Pull your nose away from the freezing cold window glass, and your eyes from the Dolly…<\/p>\n

Take a deep deep breath\u2026.<\/p>\n

And smell the oranges\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cI\u2019d rather have the dolly in the corner.\u201d \u201cI\u2019d rather have the oranges\u2026\u201d ~ A Musical Scrooge I\u2019ve been doing a lot of thinking about Christmas this year. About what it means. About what it is. About whether or not, … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[111,17,106],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5856","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-life-in-the-times-of-covid","category-reflections-below-the-waterline","category-sadie"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3GtNE-1ws","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5856","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5856"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5856\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5858,"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5856\/revisions\/5858"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5856"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5856"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5856"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}