This Christmas
“I’ve never not felt lonely over the holidays.”
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This year, to my surprise, I bought a Christmas tree.
I’m not sure how it happened. I love a lot of things about the yuletide season, but the mass consumerism, stress and expectations, all derived from a day that is supposed to celebrate the birthday of a dude that said “lets be nice to each other” really put me off. I think the tree-buying came from feeling really homesick lately. Even for stuff I don’t like that much.
The tree was second hand, and artificial. A real Charlie Brown special. It came naked, and I decided to remedy this using found pinecone decorations, and three handmade ornaments I bought off a local lady. But I love fairy lights, so I ordered some from Trendyol. Trendyol is almost the same as Amazon without being Amazon, so I can tell myself it’s not as bad.
Also, such was my sudden Grinch-like turnaround that I wanted to get a gift for the poet. Trendyol promised to deliver it to my doorstep, along with my three sets of lights, within 24 hours.
48 hours later, nothing had arrived.
One December 22nd, I got a text saying one set of lights had been delivered to a depot, 20 minutes across town. The depot happened to be in the same neighbourhood as another depot, where some dog food that I had also ordered to be delivered to my home in Grape Village was also sent.
So off we went.
First stop: dog food. “Tracking number,” the woman working at the counter said. I showed her the number I had been sent. No, she said, that wasn’t the tracking number. The tracking number was 5 digits long. Where was the tracking number?
I searched my texts and emails and could not find any number other than the one I showed her. The poet explained this. The lady shook her head.
I pointed to the box, which had my name on it, and showed her my ID. She was having none of it.
She and the poet both started speaking more loudly. The poet explained that it was not our fault that the shipping company was asking for number that did not exist. The lady refused. I just stood there with smoke coming out of my ears, longing for my home country, where things you order to be delivered to your house don’t come with a side order of Monty Python.
The lady started shouting. I imagined myself pushing her off a cliff.
I turned to the poet and said, very slowly, in English
“What will happen if I just pick. Up. That box. And walk. Out. The door?”
“She is saying she will get in trouble and maybe she will have to pay for it.”
I will spare you the details, but after more yelling and several phone calls to the delivery company, I was allowed to leave with my box of dog food. Which Django doesn’t like anyway.
Thankfully, picking up the fairy lights went much more smoothly.
Two of my favourite Fethiye friends have been back in the States for months.
They have ordered things that arrived when they were supposed to, at the right address. From Amazon, but still. They have eaten all the food. They have had casual chats with strangers.
Most importantly, they spent with their friends and their families. I miss my people unimaginably. My life in Fethiye was never brimming with social excitement, but with these friends away and me now living in a village, with someone else, which means I make less of an effort and totally judge myself about it, I have felt a lot of loneliness of late. I would give anything to go over to a friend’s house, lie on their couch, overeat, and solve the world’s problems together. To be able to talk to people in shops or while walking my dog, something that always lifted my spirits back home, especially during pandemic times.
This is not easy to admit. I’m a huge champion for building community, constantly rambling on about it in my teaching/Tarot-ing. “Reach out!” I say. “We’re not meant to do things alone! Lean on each other!”
Also, usually, I love my own company. ALSO, as my raging self-critic reminds me, I am here by choice. Dropping Turkish lessons in November because of overwhelm was also by choice. I don’t have to stay. This was always a trade-off. And really, was I that much less lonely back in Canada?
Or maybe just lonely in different ways?
My meditation teacher Cecilie once said,
“You know when you’re alone and you miss being with people? You know when you’re surrounded by people and you just wish you could be alone?”
I became obsessed with my Trendyol orders.
Every time someone drove past our house, I ran to the window. The packages were still in Istanbul, and then they were in Ankara. Then they were en route. And then, the lights would (supposedly) be delivered on Christmas Eve, and the poet’s gift on the 26th.
I did not feel festive at all about this.
“I will lend you my decorations,” my friend Jasmine said. Despite being Muslim, Jasmine decorates her house to the nines at Christmas, but this year, with two cats and a sick husband, she wasn’t feeling it. I went round for tea and she thrust a box at me that was loaded with sparkly ornaments, sparkly stars, Santas, every colour of tinsel you can imagine, and four kinds of multi-coloured lights. And an outfit for Django, that she’d bought for one of her cats but was not the right size.
My heart grew a few sizes.
That night the poet and I decorated the tree. He strung tinsel and lights from the banister. We ate pizza and admired our work.
“Can you open the gift I got you?” he asked me, again.
“I am not going to my gift,” I said, festively, “until your fucking arrives.”
December 24, midday.
None of my orders have arrived.
“Do you want me to call Trendyol?” the poet asks.
I shake my head no. “No one is going to answer. No one is going to tell us anything.”
He calls anyway.
Trendyol not only answers, but gives him the phone number of the driver, who has ALL THREE of my packages in his van. The driver then gives the poet his live location. In a scene straight out of Speed but with slightly slower vehicles, we chase the driver across town. We meet him on a side street, and he chats happily with the poet as he searches for my packages. He scans them, and hands them straight to me.
I wish I could end there.
Snowglobe snow starts falling gently over Fethiye, there are tidings of comfort and joy, everyone gets their gifts, and we all raise a glass and toast to peace and goodwill towards all beings, etc.
But I have been reminded of all the stuff about Christmas that I don’t miss. Like how I can’t even listen a Christmas carol without hearing an underlying message of HEY YOU ARE SUPPOSED TO BE HAPPIER WHAT’S WRONG WITH YOU?
There has been more loneliness. Some laughter. We hung the lights. We exchanged gifts. We hugged. We argued.
I missed family and friends. I raged against globalization.
We had Christmas at my Dad’s—guacamole and tortilla chips, more pizza, and sushi. We watched a James Bond movie. I felt heartbroken when it was over.
I have also been gently reminded that I am not the only one who feels this way.
One friend told me, “I’ve never not felt lonely over the holidays.”
So I won’t end there. I’ll end here instead.
Thanks for sharing with us we love you