’Tis the season to be compassionate and to shun conspicuous consumption

Like many people around the world, the holiday season, or what us South Africans refer to as Dezemba, is my favorite time of year. The last couple of days I have tried to conjure up the holiday spirit to save myself from despair.

All year I have looked forward to seeing the Christmas lights, watching Christmas movies, listening to Christmas carols and relaxing into a slower pace. To say this year has been bruising is an understatement. What kept some of us going was the promise of a reliable Dezemba. That somehow we could find prosperity in the latter part of this year. We held onto the hope that a global pandemic can turn our lives inside out but not even it could not defeat Dezemba.

I have with much desperation tried to pretend that even amidst the turmoil, sorrow and despair of our current times that the holiday season will be more than just salvageable but actually festive and a reward for persevering through this unforgiving year. At the start of the pandemic a friend of mine made the prediction that it would take us three months’ top to tame and eventually eliminate the COVID-19 virus.

I thought three months was optimistic and predicted that at the very latest by October we would be seeing the dawn of the virus. We thought that if we delayed our plans to December it would be a safe bet. And now here we are almost a full year since our lives were unexpectedly and unfairly interrupted and in some cases destroyed and there seems to be no light at the end of this year.

My extended family resides in Port Elizabeth which is currently experiencing a crushing second wave of the virus. Every day this past week we have been receiving news of family friends who are either in hospital or who have passed from COVID-19. The somber news is incessant. There is no reprieve. Things are so bad that my normally logical and clear headed aunt wanted to succumb to the hoax narrative- she is latching on to conspiracy theories because they offer more hope than reality. Like so many any people, she relies on church to purge during time of spiritual upheaval and the virus, as if it has not taken enough, has cruelly foreclosed that outlet.

I keep thinking about families who will be missing loved ones around their Christmas lunch tables this year. I feel the pain of those who made plans which remain unrealized.  I grieve for the family plans that have to cancelled because their loved ones are incapacitated.  I am in despair thinking of those who lost their jobs and instead of abundance this holiday season there is instead the torment of explaining to their children that there is no Christmas this year.

I too was tempted to cancel Christmas because it’s still unclear how my own family will celebrate this year considering that our annual pilgrimage to the Eastern Cape seems unwise and impossible. But instead of being paralysed by the guilt of my own survival I have realized I have to be energised by my own capacity. Life demands that this Christmas has to be about trying to do what I can for others. This is an opportunity to have the most meaningful Christmas ever if I allow myself to see beyond what is lacking in this moment. This season cannot about conspicuous consumption but about compassion. It has to be about finding the courage to have hope when all signs point to an even harder 2021. It is about finding the meaning of life beyond the excess that has come to define Christmas. It may be a simpler Christmas but it can be enriching if I allow it to be.