The tree stands proudly beside the stockings perfectly placed below the mantel.
The white granite legend where the four-lettered sock-shaped bags used to hang in alternating colors of red and green now only holds three; The pattern is offset as my initial is now the only one surrounded by a Christmas green fabric.
I sit in front of the tree as I try to distract myself from the unsettling distortion his missing piece has left above the fireplace, but I’m catching this feeling of unsettlement as my eyes stare fixated on the illumination of the flickering lights gently wrapped around the tree. A singular light contains an utter dullness that the others don’t.
A singular light is missing this Christmas.
Perhaps it’s because I know that no ornament was wrapped gently in the hands of this light, casting a shadow around the tree as it precisely placed the delicate charm on a fragile tree branch. If only it would have been here, shining, repeatedly telling me to hang the ornaments in an even fashion on each side and every branch.
Or how on Christmas Eve when we all squeeze in to watch the movie that we all hate, but our Dad loves, there will be an empty space where the brightness of this light was accounted for. And on Christmas day as we wake up way too early, the plushness of the couch will now feel more spacious as this light is no longer beside the lone three of us, awaiting the wakening of Mom and Dad.
I guess the process of opening presents will be quicker now that we don’t have to wait for it to carefully un-tape and peel back each wrinkle in the wrapping paper.
But I’m now realizing that I will not find myself surrounded by the warmth of this light around the dining room table plating our once-a-year Christmas breakfast. But at least an argument won’t form from our elbows simply bumping into the others as we each reach into the unlabeled boundaries of our personal spaces.
Each time I blink I see all things changed as this light began no longer shining amongst the rest on our tree beside the mantel.
The most puzzling thing about it all is that the light did not die out. Though it still exists, it is now shining among another set of lights, on another tree, next to another mantel. The light that I have seen shining over the past 15 years is now shining in other places.
The light is growing.
Sitting in front of this tree I wonder, who will now place the tree topper?
Though I cannot reach the top, I’ll have no choice but to resort to the step of a chair beneath me and the hopes that in Christmas to come, the light will make its way back to the vacant space on the plushness of the couch, beside the lone three of us, and it will continue to be you.
