Surviving the Holidays

Last week my parents and I went to a seminar at a nearby South Bay church called Journey of Faith which my brother's extremely close friend invited us to. During the two-hour seminar, we watched a video of testimonials whom share their own grief and experiences, along with coping skills and tools. We were also divided into two groups to speak amongst a smaller circle. "My name is Yolanda and I lost my brother two months ago". I listened to others cry and share their very similar feelings of loss and anti-holiday sentiments. My parents cried, saying that they don't feel the holidays- they don't care. And truthfully, neither do I.

I moved into my brother's house a month ago with both the encouragement of the positive people in my life and the nay sayers who thought (and still think) "how could she? he died there." Charley is not going to haunt me. There's such a significant difference between haunting and visiting; haunting causes distress and anxiety and disturbance. This is real-life, people. Charley doesn't drop items, slam doors and walk down the hallway ferociously banging metal chains against the wall. He is a spirit who protects Mia and myself, who has engaging conversations with Mia and makes her laugh, a soul who wraps his energy around me and comforts me when I cry and plead for him to return. Most of the time I talk to him and hope he'll reply.
The things I do to experience a visual presence are so silly: As I bathe I write his name "Charley" on one of the glass shower walls and ask him to reply with "Yolie", I intentionally leave pennies laying around or items out-of-place so that he can move them, I intently stare at my hanging lanterns to see if they sway, I stare into the darkness (which I'm now terrified of) and strain my eyes to see him swiftly glide by. ANYTHING. I'll take anything.

My brother loved the holidays and always looked forward to Christmas even though the shift he was on at the station usually had him working the holidays. Last year we spent Thanksgiving here at his house for the first time in seven years. Thankfully we took pictures and snagged a video of him...thank God we did that. It's our last Thanksgiving with him. For the Christmas holidays, he bought a tree, decorated it and placed it in front of his huge dining room window, posted a picture to social media and exclaimed, "I loved the holidays!". He was so proud of his tree. He hadn't purchased one until last year and he purchased his house four years ago. Do I put a tree and lights up? Do I celebrate for Mia and for him? Would he want us to mope and sadly skip the holidays? No, he wouldn't. We will try to do what we can. But Thanksgiving....it's in 5 days and we don't even care. We're thankful for each other, but how are we supposed to sit around a table and see that Charley is missing? HOW??!!!