Winter Blues

Facing Winter Hardships

    It was not a very merry Christmas for us in 2025. To start, things had been reaching a boiling point in regards to our living situation. An irritating shift in the dynamics of our neighborhood prompted me to commit fully to renovating and preparing our house for list. We've had enough of it here and want to move far away, if we can afford to. The whole process has been very daunting. It's involved a lot of money, time and physical labor. We had a flooring install done in November, only to have them miscalculate the number of required planks; we ended up without a kitchen for an entire month. I had hoped to have our agent out for an assessment but with all of our furniture and appliances displaced we ended up calling it off. My birthday came and went, bitterly cold as such, and we managed to have a mildly enjoyable weekend away from the house, which, given the state of things was much appreciated. We stayed in a large bungalow basement apartment rental on an operational farm. The peace and quietude bolstered my desire to live solitarily in the country. Every house I passed on our way home called out to me. When we would go for road trips to see distant relatives I'd wonder at every little farmhouse and what it would be like to live there. I longed for a new perspective.

    My Nana died on Jan. 3rd. On December 26th she suffered a terrible fall which ultimately lead to a brain bleed. She had a stroke and struggled with aphasia. I wish I could say that I was extremely close to my grandmother but the truth is I'm not very close to anyone in my family. I love them, of course, but I don't think I quite have the deep understanding that I experience with my husband or my best girl friend, Elisabeth. It's a familial love that I have for her. When I was a little girl I was convinced my Nan must be a descendent from British royalty, her house was always so prim, proper and perfumed. It had a lovely smell to it, not clinical, just cleanly and fresh and to be honest very different from the house I grew up in (my parents are hoarders). It was like stepping into another country which would be accurate to an extent as both my grandparents were British expats. My Papa had initiated their emigration to Canada. My Nan was an unwilling participant. She loved England. Her entire life she lamented leaving her home country and it was devastating to hear the true nature behind their relationship. She was a byproduct of an incredibly misogynistic and sexist era. She was wed and that meant that she had to fall in line. Young and with child she made her way overseas by boat, and alone because her husband had already left and made the "arrangements" without her. She lead a hard life. She worked in factories and cafeterias and paid the bills herself (lord only knows what the hell he was doing). That's why it was so wonderful to see her come into herself in her fifties and early sixties. She had made a strong core group of female friends with whom she golfed, shopped and travelled. It was a long running joke that you couldn't call her on certain days because she'd be on the "horn" with her friend Mary for hours. Her retirement was filled with many social occasions and I'm grateful for that because, I have little doubt, she had longed for something more. 

    I didn't get to spend Christmas with her. We were to meet on the 27th, as is the tradition, with a nice party full of appetizers and sweets. I can't fully remember if I visited her on the 28th or the 29th... but it was before New Years. We were told she wouldn't last that long. I was also told she would be asleep and unable to speak. I had no idea when my husband and I visited her in the hospital that she'd be awake and attempting to make conversation. The aphasia had practically decimated her ability to communicate. We tried to pretend she wasn't dying. We smiled half heartedly, told her all about the beautiful Christmas tree we have up this year, that my kitchen and dining area finally look half decent, that we missed her very much and we regret not seeing her on Christmas Day. Also that we would be celebrating our ten year anniversary in August and buying a new home to live in. She struggled to say something about the Christmas tree, I put my hand on her reassuringly and told her that I knew it was difficult to talk. We told her that we loved her very much and to my amazement, clear as day, she said she loved us very much. She looked so exhausted just getting the words out, like she was in agony. It took everything in me not to cry. We told her there'd be more visitors on the way that day, to my annoyance that apparently wasn't true, but I'm happy to know that her last conversation was one of love. I hugged her and tucked her in just as she used to do for me when I slept over. In her final days her children visited frequently, she slept the whole while through, right up to the end when they were by her side. 

    On the day she died a sundog shot up from the clouds, a happy pastel rainbow in a dreary winter setting, I thought of her. I felt it was probably time, so when my mother made the call it only made sense to me. I like to imagine that rainbow came down for her. 

    Anyone who really knows me knows that I hate winter. I always get post Christmas blues but this year is the worst of it. We didn't have a family Christmas. I celebrated with Brandon but we worked up until eight o'clock Christmas Day so it wasn't much of a celebration. Elisabeth visited me on boxing day, we crafted together for several hours and that day felt more like Christmas to me at the time. I visited family briefly on the 27th to give them all of their cookie boxes. It pained me to not pack Nan's. To know she wouldn't be apart of it...they had removed her feeding tube that day. We sat at my parents house talking of Nan but then of random things to ease the tension. For a glimmering moment it felt okay, even though we knew it wasn't. 

    I packed up the tree around epiphany, it started to bring more pain than joy to look at it. I know my parents still have theirs up. I switched off my Christmas lights yesterday. I needed them to help me get through the darkness. I think of her in waves. I think of how she always had knit slippers around the house and would give them to me to keep my feet warm when I visited. I remember Avon, the perfumes, jewelry and trinkets and how she'd have a stash of catalogue purchases on hand to gift people at random. I remember the radio in the living room and how it used to play Easy Listening AM which stopped airing probably ten years ago. I wish it would come back. I also remember the summers by the pool, the hot chocolate in September when we got too cold, the trifle in July and August served on scalloped spoons. The KFC dinners, the shouting UNO games. How she drank shandies and how when I realized as an adult what a shandy was I almost fell off my stool. I remember the sparkling Christmases in the basement by the fire and the delicious meals. But more than anything I'll remember how she talked of England, her family, her parents' boarding house, Llandudno and Uncle Ian. 

    I think she's apart of the reason I'm so driven to leave. The timing is bittersweet. It's not only getting away from the reality that someone else is going to live in my Nan's house, and swim in our pool, and eat sweets in our kitchen... It's because so many opportunities were taken from her. She always told me to value my independence, in her case that comment was in regards to her car, she loved being able to jump in and go anywhere... but if you dig deeper those words read differently; I think it was the fact that she could get in her car and drive off when her husband was being abusive, when life didn't look the way that she had hoped. She could get in her car and go golfing for an afternoon, or visit a friend, or shop, or go to church. It allowed her some control over her life again. She did not live an easy life...and in her honor I'll be damned if I settle or let people dictate how or where I'm going to live. I want to experience life for myself. I want to try the country property out, to learn whether I love it or hate it, because that's a privilege! If I can take away one solid lesson from my Nan it's that you have to live your life for yourself.  

I would love a country garden where I can make a little space for her. 

A little English garden for my Nana.