There are a million reasons I can think of for hating Christmas: the killing, selling and tossing of beautiful, fragrant trees; buying presents with money you probably don't have; writing Christmas cards with no inspiration; withstanding grown ass people wearing santa hats; being reprimanded for not closing your eyes during grace at dinner.
I am pretty sure if I try and look closely into this Christmas tradition, I could find a dozen more reasons to justify its unnatural, fabricated nature. Nonetheless, at my 27 years, Christmas is one of the few events that still beautifully renews the love I feel for my family, and somewhat reminds me of forgotten little things I used to love about living in Dominican Republic. Although I am fully conscious of its religious origins and its consumerist societal byproducts, La Navidad takes me back to a childhood place in la isla where, unaware of family conflicts and related neuroses, being around my family was a pleasure in its purest stage; enjoying the smell of puerco asado and stealing a cuerito or two before it was served at dinner, shaking my gifts under the christmas tree to get a clue of what they were, listening to Navidad que vuelve over Ponche Crema de Oro, getting a handful of bucapiés from my brothers and smashing them against the sidewalks in my neighborhood....putting a cohete in a Coca Cola bottle and watching it blow up in the sky in a million different colors.
Now, as I share homemade ponche with my family in New York, as I sing Alegre vengo de la montaña feeling the cold air seep through the windows, as my son aks: mamá llegó santa? and wakes up in a joyful jump to open his presents, as I eat Dominican food leftovers with the girls, smiling and our eyes still stained with last night's makeup, I realize how benevolent Christmas is, and wish that maybe, If I close my eyes for a second, I could still see the color of the cohetes from la isla blowing up incessantly in the New York sky.
4 comments:
I miss you woman. Wish you would have come to Sto Dgo for xmas. Love you.
I feel you on so many different levels. And my conclusion is like yours. In the end, I just choose to focus on the beauty that IS there.
I was googling your name under "images" and this blog came up. Que bien! Me gusta leer the story behind the photos
Gracias Raquel!...I feel my identity is contested ongoingly since I moved to NYC, which aspects of my culture do I conserve? which things are not really part of me but just imposed? what does it really mean to live authentically?...Christmas exacerbates these questionings in me
Christmas is just as beautiful as your pictures and all the joy they reflect. I love to be around you and your family, our family :)
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