And Just Like That...We Cancelled Our Christmas Plans This Year

“Life changes in the instant. The ordinary instant.”

Or so says Joan Didion. But over the years, I, too have come to find that to be true. Such was the case yesterday when we found out two of our family members tested positive for covid, effectively leading us all to cancel our family holiday trip to New York. It was somehow both an easy and difficult decision to make, but in the end we’re both happy we decided to stay home this year.

The plans were all set: our family (us, my brother and his wife, my younger sister and her girlfriend, my mom, all of her brothers and sisters, etc.) would be going to New York for Christmas for the first time in over 13 years. I spent every Christmas there until I was in high school, and to this day it’s still the place I long for the most on December 25th. The snow, the bite in the air, all the aunts and uncles gathering around the table talking over each other. My family is Lebanese and from New York, so you can imagine how loud (and fun) it gets when we’re all together.

We were all looking forward to this trip, especially PJ. He’s never been to upstate New York (I’ve warned him it’s nothing special, but to my family it is, and to not have any expectations. He has assured me over and over that he has none) but has always wanted to go after listening to me talk about it over the years. My mom is from a small town with not much to do, but it’s still home to her and, in many ways, to me. It reminds me of my childhood and my cousins and all of us sledding for hours at the ball diamond and going on adventures in the snowy woods behind my Sitto’s house and making home movies and playing Trivial Pursuit while eating pizza from the local Tony’s Pizza.

My Sitto and Jiddo’s (Arabic for grandmother and grandfather) house was an old building that had been converted into various apartments that they all owned. It was old and charming and not very updated in the traditional sense. It felt warm and welcoming, with wallpaper on almost every wall and always a lot of people in and out. At least during the holidays, it was very loud: people talking over one another, trading funny stories, an argument of some kind erupting, etc.

I remember waking up most mornings, stumbling into the kitchen still half asleep, and it always smelling of oranges. Sitto would wake up before anyone else and start peeling them for all of the grandkids to eat. Everyone spent their days in their pajamas and slipper socks (that my Sitto made), or in their snow suits and snow boots. It was a time for all of the grown up children, my aunts and uncles, to be kids again. They were home and they all played games around the kitchen table, made Lebanese food and stayed up late catching up on each other’s lives from the past year.

I have nothing but good memories from the years we spent our Christmases in upstate New York, and I hope we can make new ones again soon.

But, hopefully next year we can! We have a big family group thread going on of everyone who was going to be there, and once the texts started rolling in of people saying they were positive on their last-minute, just-in-case tests they took, and once my aunt said that covid cases are soaring in New York and people are cancelling events left and right, we all slowly started texting back that maybe we should just cancel the whole thing. We were all going back and forth (should we still come? should we not? how can we make this work regardless?) until finally, we all made the decision to not do a big family Christmas this year.

It only makes sense, right? There were going to be a lot of us in one space for a number of days, which, looking back on it now, doesn’t seem like the smartest thing to plan for in the first place. I think that’s what desperation does, though. It clouds your judgement and emotions take the lead. We all so desperately wanted to be together celebrating our favorite holiday like we used to before my Sitto and Jiddo passed away many years ago. I think we so desperately wanted to recreate that magic that only a big family all together in one place can bring. But it’s just not in the cards this year. And that’s okay.

I would rather spend the holidays apart, safely, than together and risk everyone getting sick. It’s not worth it. If you have had to cancel your holiday plans this year, my heart is with you. PJ was sad and I was sad and the kids were sad they weren’t going to be able to stay at a hotel for the first time ever, but we assured them they will one day, and it will be well worth the wait. We’re all good and we’re excited to make the most of it safely at home this year. On the plus side, this will be our first Christmas at home together as an official family! I love the idea of the kids spending the holidays where they feel the safest, and waking up where they know what to expect.