Cardboard boxes stack high in the streets. Some folded like new shirts, hoping for a recycling miracle. Others look like they fell out of the back of a pickup after a sharp turn. Garbage bags with glints and a glimmers of wrapping paper pile on porches, by doors, by mailboxes. Kids test out their new rides – a scooter, a skateboard and an unsteady pair of roller skates. A boy throws a football high in the air, catches it and throws it again, oh to have a brother.
A visit to the nursing home on the other side of town, on the other side of the circular park. This is not a park. The saddest place on Christmas Day. We make small talk, about old days, better days, lost days. We offer a present, a navy nightgown, look at faded photos on stark walks. We gradually get used to the smell. For better or for worse. Everyone gets tired, the forced-conversation kind of tired. We hug our goodbyes and walk out of the dark room, down the long hall and into the empty elevator. We are silent. What is there to say when you’ve left a friend behind? Nothing. We say nothing.
Today’s it’s back to the local mall and to internet mail orders; too small, too big, too long, too short. Where are the receipts? I have nowhere to go today. Our first Christmas of the season is in the books, another at home in Virginia awaits and a third with Mom and Dad at the beach. We’ll tick them off like lines on a to-do list.
