To my dearest friends T and A -
Have you ever received a Christmas letter from any of your friends?
There is an article that I saw in an online version of a 1954 December issue of the Atlantic Monthly, authored by William Copithorne (was that his real name I wonder?) which describes these missives perfectly in “From Us to You”:
One would have been enough, for the letters were indistinguishable in style and content. Posing innocently as Christmas greetings, they were unabashed family sagas. The writers touched lightly on the misfortunes which their families suffered during the year, dwelt gladly on happy events, and missed no opportunity for self-congratulation.
Source : https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1954/12/from-us-to-you/308860/
Your Christmas letters are either sent in place of a Christmas card, or sometimes they are contained therein. And they will invariably open with a “From the Smith Family,” but you never address them to me.
What then follows is one poorly constructed paragraph after another summarizing the highlights of your year in review - mostly all positive things except for one or two negative events couched in hopeful and positive language, like “Aunty Hetty died peacefully in her sleep, she was 200 years old, and well, we all know she is in a better place now” [insert Bible verse here].
Please tell me that you have received a Christmas letter at least once. How did it make you feel when you received it?
Well, like the erstwhile Mr. Copithorne, I hate to break it to you, but break it to you I must: I am none too fond of receiving your Christmas letters, both for the reasons he lists in his little article, but also for reasons that are all my own.
Let me start with the first reason I do not like receiving your Christmas letters: if you are you really my friend why do you send me a Christmas letter that details all the fun things you do with others, but not with me?
Now, I know what you are going to say - “but you moved away from Chicago, so how can your friends there do anything with you when you have to travel the 2000 miles to get there - or vice versa?”
Right, I get that, but please hear me out.
If we have not seen each other in person in a number of years, and we have not talked regularly, much less seen each other’s posts on Facebook and the like, what makes you think I would be remotely interested in you seeing a 2021 version of Buried Child at the Steppenwolf theater back home and how you had dinner at Cafe Lutz afterwards? I was not there with you, you nincompoop! And who cares anyway?
So, here I am reading your letter and I must feel the feelings that I do not like feeling. The feeling of remembering just how good life was once back home.
Ah, if there is anything I seriously miss about our hometown (as it is with anyone who has spent the larger part of their adult life in an international city like Chicago) as opposed to a suburb identifying as a major American city like Phoenix, is the pride of place and the commitment to excellence in its cultural institutions.
This is not to say that Phoenix lacks a cultural life. Not at all. The wealthy here have bestowed a wonderful rich cultural legacy in Phoenix. The problem is that the audience for these offerings is small, and most of the citizens here are oblivious to the richness of these institutions amid breathtaking natural beauty.
It is galling to meet someone who has lived in Phoenix all his/her/their life and not know where the Herberger Theater is, much less seen a play or performance there.
But it is true that I miss life back home. I would give my eye teeth right now to go to hear the Civic Orchestra (the farm team of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra - CSO for short) play Shostakovich’s Tenth Symphony at The South Shore Country Club on a blustery cold Sunday afternoon and take a walk along the lake shore viewing the city from the south looking north - the lights glittering against a blue-black sky and iced over Lake Michigan, watching the cold turn my breath to ice while listening to the winds, as the Hawks of a Chicago winter fly overhead.
But nooooo, here I am reading your darn Christmas letter, sitting at a picnic ramada set by a manufactured lake and waterfall surrounded by palm trees swaying in the distance while watching the sunset turn an azure blue sky into a vermillion one, serenaded by the various species of birds. This simulacrum of a tropical paradise is pleasant enough. I mean it is great to be sitting outside at beginning of January wearing just sweater to keep warm. Really. And yet at the same time I find tears welling up in my eyes as suddenly I feel what I believe to be the homesick longing of an Argentine immigrant dock worker thousands of miles from his native Minsk at the turn of the century before last.
My God, the cruelty of your Christmas letters! It is as if you, the writer, is taunting me, “see what you are missing [in your life]?”
An exaggeration you say. Perhaps. And yet - the grief is real.
The second reason I hate receiving your Christmas letters is: they are soooo impersonal! Addressed to everyone on your list - I am now merely “just a client” that receives the firm’s yearly performance newsletter?
And, my dear Christmas letter writers, why are you sending me such a generic letter at that? If you have time to type up a chipper, grammatically correct single spaced texted words in 11 point Arial font, why do you not have time to send me a Christmas card: one of which you can buy at the dollar-twenty-five-cent store - a box that can be had for less than the price you would pay for postage to send your darned Christmas letter especially if you buy it on sale the day after Christmas with a personal note containing the following eleven (11) words: Miss you. Wish you were here. Let us get in touch.
Is that such a big of an ask? Why is this level of reaching out to me in this fashion such a pain in the ass?
What is stopping you from just contacting me directly sometime during a year just to say hello? It is not like we must wait six months for a letter sealed with the royal crest of the Spanish Kings, dispatched by a courier who must travel from Spain to around the Straits of Magellan and then it delivered by Pony Express now-a-days that you must regard your annual communication me to a once-a-year ordeal. We do live in the age of instant contact, so what about a telephone call? An e-mail? A random text message? A singing telegram?
The third reason I do not like your Christmas letters is: you never ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ask me how am I doing?
Well, since you did not ask, let me just tell you.
Just between you, me, and the lamp post, my ego is not doing too well.
This year I turned the big 6-0, and it does not take but a two second glance in the mirror reminding me that all my youth and beauty are gone like the life savings of a high rolling gambler after a three-day bender in Las Vegas.
Oh, and the former love of my life, my dance partner, my best friend in the whole wide world has developed dementia to the point where his family is getting ready to sell his home in order for him live in an assisted living facility, and he remembers nothing - absolutely nothing - about our relationship much less me, or his other friends. No one ever tells you how galling, how humiliating this to see a loved one lose their life before actually losing it. Though it is not intentional or personal, and it is something that happens to millions of people who love and care for friends, spouses and relatives with dementia, only for me to be told by paid and credentialed professionals like a therapist I fired recently who said that it’s just nature running its course and that I should just suck it up, buttercup.
Or, what about my frenemy Jill who died an ignominious death in a Covid ward, and a close co-worker whose 26-year-old son, newly married who just shared the same fate this past Christmas day?
Other than those losses, I am fine just in case you wondered. At least I am still standing, surprised as hell to learn of the strength and resilience I never knew I had. Instead of accepting defeat I continue to live at the top of my intelligence and will continue fight for my life until the very end.
And, I am reminded, too, of people who truly are my friends the ones that send handwritten letters addressed to me directly, the ones who consistently send me Christmas cards usually with a note addressed to me personally - indicating to me that, at least in that moment when you put the card in the envelope and seal it you are thinking about me, which is so much more than I can say about you and your stupid Christmas letters.
In fact, why did you bother to send me a letter at all?