This is undoubtedly the biggest day of the year here in the Byington household—a tradition gleaned from my mother more than anyone else. I’m most certain my sisters and my brother are thinking many of the same thoughts today as they sit with their respective families and chat away the long winter night.
In Anaconda, Christmas Eve took weeks of preparation. We’d start the day after Thanksgiving. There was the usual hubbub about the tree, certainly something that goes on in most people’s houses. But it was beyond the tree that concerned my mother, who would cover every flat surface with some kind of decoration. As she aged, this did not get better.
There were knick-knacks and angel hair and pine cones and ceramic figurines and … well, you get my point. Two of these stick out in my mind this morning. One was a sleigh made out of felt that had been glued to a turkey breast bone. It held Christmas cards and letters. The other was a mistletoe thing. (No shit, the word “thing” is the only way to describe this.) It was, I believe, a styrofoam ball, around which empty plastic medication cups (like the kind of the top of NyQuil bottles) were glued or stuck with pins. The cups had been rimmed with Elmer’s glue and red and green glitter. The result was … spectacular.
The cooking would start around 8:00 a.m. and not stop until dark, when boatloads of relatives would appear and pack themselves into our house. The food would be laid out on the kitchen table and everyone would use my mother’s china and silver to sit with a plate in their laps, wherever they could find a space. (It was a casual/elegant type of deal.) Then the exchange of gifts and goodbyes. Seems fairly standard.
But it was the spaces between those events that fill my mind on Christmas Eve. The idea that I could have more than one canned shrimp. The incredible, incomparable taste of my aunt Glenna’s pies. If we were lucky, we’d get my uncle Orlin drunk enough that he would yodel. (My uncle Orlin was a first-class yodeler, but he only did it when he’d had a few.) My uncle Julian, generally a quiet, gentle man, would actually roughhouse with us. I adored him. He was the only man I’ve ever known who consistently and successfully wore a hat. My dear aunt Pauline’s hearty laughter … it is all so tightly wound into the fabric of my day today.
When it was all over, and the relatives would leave, my brother and his wife would linger longer at the open door than any of the others. My parents and my sister would go to bed, and I would turn off every light, save the Christmas tree, and watch the midnight mass from St. Peter’s Basilica, the Latin pouring over my head, anointing me with the rich and powerful unction of places far, far away.
I can only hope the same for everyone, everywhere today. As I sit down to my adopted family of theater friends tonight, I’ll intone the same wish I’ve had since I’ve started hosting a Christmas Eve gathering: God, thank you for this night and these friends. Please keep your watchful eye over all who do not have a roof over their heads, or who are coming to a table less bountiful than ours. We add to this our fervent wish for peace.