on community.

I celebrated Christmas with my girls on the morning of the 24th. After opening gifts, they broke out the Just Dance 4 while I made cinnamon rolls and sipped a mimosa. We had more than enough, so I took some down to a neighbor I barely know, along with the remaining champagne and orange juice. She invited me in, motioning toward the kitchen. It was farm-like and charming, with nice windows, a brick wall, and dinner remnants from the night before. I set the warm rolls on the stove and took a seat at the small table, endeared by junk mail and bills scattered across its surface. She scooted them aside, making space for a fresh container of blackberries as she offered me a cup of instant coffee. She took a seat across from me, her red fuzzy robe wrapped loosely around black and white striped cotton pajamas. We chatted about our daughters, an imperfect school system, and the lack of community in a university town focused on students. I could tell she was smart and successful, with strong ideas about education and the social structure of our community that fails to demand more of itself. It was all true, but foreboding.

I wanted to stop her and the sadness that was now pervading our conversation, even though what she was saying was completely accurate. I wanted to say, you know, we’re here right now, neighbors who barely know each other, sharing cinnamon rolls and blackberries on Christmas Eve. This is where it starts. We can't demand more of ourselves as a community until we demand more of ourselves as human beings, as neighbors. We don’t have to subscribe to cynicism – regardless of its reality – to appear intelligent or create positive change. And, then I got thinking about cynicism and my own tendency to fear and not embrace the good in my life.  I wonder if, like Brene Brown says, it is a fear of actually feeling joy, “because we are so keenly aware that it’s fleeting”. It’s like a way of protecting ourselves…. “it is easier to live disappointed than to feel disappointed” – like we’re beating it to the punch by numbing our vulnerability in order to avoid the feeling of pain and loss. But, when we numb the bad, we numb the good. Even though "our capacity for joy is only as great as our willingness to feel pain and sadness." We can’t have one without the other and to avoid one means avoiding the other. When we focus on the lack, like say, community, we might not see it when it is right in front of us.

A solo Christmas Day meant sleeping in and good beer.  I really wasn’t sad, but there were a few times when I felt like I should be sad. Halfway through the day, I went to our hospital to try and visit people without family or visitors. No one was alone - which was a good thing - but I left feeling a little disappointed, as though I didn't really make a difference, which sounds awful, as though my intentions were more about me and not truly altruistic. Perhaps I was also looking for significance, but I did want to make people happy and see them smile. And, I didn't want to sit around and bemoan what used to be. I am afraid talking about it negates the good deed, as though it was just for "vainglory" as my upbringing suggests, but I do want to inspire people and I do want to reread this and remember the joy I felt anticipating creating smiles, so I guess I will leave it at that. Looking back, I wish now that I had sat down with the random man playing Christmas carols at the lobby piano or joined the family of the struggling woman who was just diagnosed with cancer.

I suppose I still can.