If We Make It Through December— Merle Haggard

#365Songs: December 24th

If we make it through December
Everything’s gonna be all right, I know
It’s the coldest time of winter
And I shiver when I see the falling snow
If we make it through December
Got plans to be in a warmer town come summertime
Maybe even California
If we make it through December, we’ll be fine

I’ll start by saying I’ve always liked Christmas music. In theory. Back before every store, commercial, and internet ad started playing the same songs over and over beginning in September. I know, I know, I sound Grinchy, and perhaps I am, a tad, but it’s just too much for far too many months.

But in all seriousness, it’s a season that brings with it a lot of bittersweet emotions. Nostalgia is a bitch this time of year, thinking of all those Christmases long ago, surrounded by those now lost to death, politics, and time.

This was, after all, my Mother’s favorite time of year, and yet, aside from those early Christmas morning moments when she watched my sister and me open gifts — a year’s worth of savings revealed all at once — she never seemed to be having all that much fun. So much stress, so many people to please, jello molds to labor over.*

*This requires an aside. My mother made a seven layer jello mold, all the colors, with sour cream or some white shit like it between the layers. No, really, think about this. You can’t dump all that into one mold and then just fridge that muddled mess. You need to boil a color, wait for it to cool, put it in the dish, then wait for it to harden. Then, add the white shit. Let that cool. Then repeat, over and over, until you reach seven layers. This jello mold process, an annual affair, was the only time my mother was capable of murder, and it was an endless process, a “leave the house and don’t come back until she’s done” experience.

Got laid off down at the factory
And their timing is not the greatest in the world
Heaven knows I’ve been working hard
I wanted Christmas to be right for Daddy’s girl
I don’t mean to hate December
It’s meant to be the happy time of year
But my little girl don’t understand
Why Daddy can’t afford no Christmas gear

But also… My dad got laid off a lot when I was a kid. A loyal worker in struggling factories during difficult times in a troubled old dying town meant darker days always lurked around the corner. He never made much more in a year than I made in my first post-college job, and yet he knew what to do with it, understood where to invest, how to save, and what to avoid. He saved what he could, all year, to ensure that what sat wrapped under the tree met our wildest expectations. And it always did.

Perhaps that’s why there was always a pained half smile on my mother’s face as we opened those gifts — a desire to please, hope that we got what we wanted, sadness that it was already over, and perhaps a whole lot of fear that they’d overspent at the expense of something else.

And though I was always so thankful for those Christmas mornings, I appreciate them so much more now knowing how much sacrifice and anxiety went into bulking the load under that tree each year.

Nostalgia is always tinted with a degree of sadness, an awareness that every memory holds complexities and contradictions.

If we make it through December
Everything’s gonna be all right, I know
It’s the coldest time of winter
And I shiver when I see the falling snow
If we make it through December
Got plans to be in a warmer town come summertime
Maybe even California
If we make it through December, we’ll be fine

Look, I say all this knowing that I spoil the shit out of my own kid, overdoing it even when times were tough, even when I knew every gift would cost twice as much once the interest was paid off the credit cards. That’s just what we do at Christmas because that’s what was done for us.

But why?

We just went through an election season where the majority of American voters complained about rising prices, corporate greed, products manufactured in China, inflation, and yet while all those things are still true we’re all out there overdoing it once again in the name of… a peasant boy from a peasant village?

Sure, all those nice wise men (where were the women?) dropped gifts at his little baby feet, but they weren’t doing it for him, they were doing it for themselves. Look at me, I’m wise! I saw a star! That’s God’s kid! Let’s kiss his ass to get in his good graces! Hey, here are some gifts, kiddo, don’t forget me.

Since we care so much about what Jesus would do in this country… Rather than run down to the Nazareth Walmart, Jesus would’ve worked the shelters, passed out food, and housed a stranger or two. In America, we shun the unhoused, deport the neighbor, and trashcan our leftovers.

And hey, I ain’t no better. I’m judging myself here too. I just fed the capitalistic machine more than I should’ve. It just feels so much harder to swallow this year. Maybe I miss my Mom (definitely not the jello mold), maybe I’m processing the passing of time and life transitions, but it feels bigger than that. The melancholy is less about what’s lost in the past and more about all that awaits us once the lights come down, once the calendar changes years, once the empathy well runs dry and the dark ages begin again.

If we make it through December
Everything’s gonna be all right, I know

Christmas is, and always has been, a day of giving, and yet we’re buried so deep in an era of taking away: rights, jobs, freedoms. So it just feels so out of place, this temporary generosity, this moment of time when we forget about “inflation” and “China” and all those faraway children stitching together our gifts during 20-hour shifts. But hey! At least corporate profits will be strong this year!

Dammit, y’all. I did it again! A whimsical, nostalgic Christmas essay turned into a political doom spiral. Apologies. Perhaps next year, I’ll make us all a whiskey-laced seven-layer jello mold to take the edge off.

If we make it through December
Everything’s gonna be all right, I know

~

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