Five

This year we are "doing" Christmas... sort of.

Our awesome little fixer upper sits nestled in an older neighborhood alight with twinkle lights, icicle lights, reindeer, snowmen... you get the picture. Our new neighbors dig Christmas. A few weeks ago I turned the corner coming home and realized that I didn't loathe the lights, didn't hate the stupid snowmen. It was actually kind of ok.

We hung lights, net lights, icicle lights, even those crazy colorful lights that could give people seizures. We had plenty from another life, the life when I was one of those crazy Christmas people. This season couldn't come soon enough or last long enough. The hubby made a "no Christmas tree before Thanksgiving" rule because I would have pulled a Hobby Lobby otherwise. LOVED IT.

I don't love it anymore.

There is a reason the suicide rate is the highest during the holidays. This is the time when we celebrate. We bring our families together. We count our damn blessings. We have tree decorating parties and memories and babies in footie PJs squealing with delight.

Except those of us who don't.

My oldest remembers before. He remembers the hot cocoa, the Christmas music, the traditions. He remembers. His heart doesn't bleed with every memory like ours. He wants these things. He deserves these things.

I cant bring myself to play Christmas music or to make a big deal out of decorating the tree. The memory of the last time rips and twists in my heart. I can't. Maybe someday I will but not now. I bought a new tree. I couldn't put up the one that Damon pulled down, permanently making it katywompus. I couldn't pull out the old ornaments. I couldn't open the box that holds his "baby's first Christmas" hat even though I can tell you exactly where it is, exactly what the hat looks like. It's too much. I bought new ornaments. I couldn't find orange ones so I converted silver ones with orange glitter. The rainbow baby has already attempted eating most of them, they are scratched and squished and bent. Somehow that feels better.

"Mommy, can we please have stockings this year?" My oldest asked a few weeks ago.

This is the one I most dreaded. I have to make a decision. Will I hang four stockings or five? Do I not hang a stocking for my dead baby or do I hang a stocking that will scream its emptiness at me for the next month?

Five, we hung five.

It hurts. I hurt. Everything hurts.

Until next time...