My Christmas Story.

I didn't know what day it was, just that Christmas was coming.

I'd spent a week asleep. At least, that's how I remember it. And it wouldn't be too unusual if i had, considering my propensity to stay awake for days on end-- not really eating or drinking, just. ..awake. Vibrantly awake. I felt full of inspiration, the need to work. So I wouldn't be surprised if the crash was just as thorough.

J was worried about me, but he wasn't home much. Our holiday plans were far from settled, though we had ideas of going home to see the folks. We couldn't seem to finalize anything. In fact, our communications had deteriorated to the point that any (in hindsight) reasonable queries from J about my behavior or my plans were answered with a host of questions from me, or demands that he account for his part in the state of our home, finances, love life or lack thereof.

My memory of these passages is a little hazy. My dream life had become so vivid, and my dreams were telling me things-- about my marriage, about our families, about my project, about our pasts. My dreams were important, but I couldn't express how to J. I felt I understood them. I felt like my subconscious had won some inside track to our families' dynamics.

Sometimes the dreams made me feel powerful. Other times I awoke, weeping with regret, only to fall asleep into some new terrain.

So I'm not sure what day it was when I woke up-- just that Christmas was soon but hadn't happened yet.

I awoke with a dictate that seemed to make sense to me at the time-- I would cut off my hair. This would bring me closer to J, because, as I phrased it at the time, he "would get to be the pretty one." And it made sense on other levels, or so I told myself. I'd been writing about religious experiences. Don't most people who have religious experiences cut off their hair? Nuns, Buddhist monks, the Dominican tonsure, etc., etc.

These things were what I told myself as I stood in my bathroom weeping, cutting my hair with the dull shears we kept in there for bandages.

I put on some of J's clothes, and felt powerful and masculine. But there was something more I was supposed to do. I looked at our mail, turning the pages this way and that, reading upside down and side-ways, looking for clues.

I found the box my wedding ring came in, and twisted my ring off my finger to put it inside. Then I took one of my husband's hats, and filled it with the hair I'd left in the sink. I tucked the hat inside a stocking cap J had worn as a boy, and nestled the box with my wedding ring inside. I wrapped the tail of the cap around what I'd begun to think of as my selkie's pelt, pulled on a coat and wandered outside. I didn't lock the door.

Outside, I felt strong, like how I imagined a man might feel walking the city streets at night. I headed north, towards Inwood, occasionally skipping or dancing to obscure my path to unseen followers. I felt like the night was full of clues and omens.

An old lady with a black bag was one sign. The poster outside the pizza parlour, read sideways, was another. Two girls, alike enough to be twins, were a sign I should take a different route.

Eventually, I found myself in front of a huge light-up nativity scene, with subsidiary scenes on both sides. I stood for a while, watching it, clutching my stocking-cap pelt to my chest. I read posted signs to see if I could draw alternate significance from them. I watched passers-by.

Suddenly I knew what I should do. I walked slowly to the central image, and laid the stocking-cap pelt on top of the lit-up manger holding the baby Jesus. I stood there for a while, leaning over the wrought-iron fence, one leg outstretched for balance, one hand over the pelt over the plastic baby, in some strange benediction.

Then I skipped and danced my way home.

J had been home already, and had left in a panic to find me. He'd left a note in the wreath on our door for me to stay put if I came back before he did.

I did, and he came back, and things were safe again but strange.

A few days later, after the manic episode had subsided, I saw the box my wedding ring came in, the one I'd left on the Baby Jesus, resting inside a wine glass on a shelf.

I approached it slowly, took out the box.

"Honey, did you put this here?"

"Yes, I found it that night and put it there for safe-keeping."

I opened the box, took out the ring and twisted it back onto my finger. Then I gave him a big kiss.

"It's a Christmas miracle."

Comments

[Deb]

I love you, Roo.

Your honesty is stunning. You probably don't even realize how brave you are to write these things publicly.

Thank you so much for daring to do it.