Christmas, one year later.

A year ago, shortly after Thanksgiving, my father sat down hard on the curb after losing his balance as he got out of the car. The force of sitting down cracked bones in his back; his subsequent treatment got him into a hospital system that seemed to want to focus on everything but his back and his pain, and just shy of spring, Dad died.

 Christmas last year was a desperate attempt to seem normal, in my parents' home which was anything but. Christmas this year was perfectly normal, except that everything has changed. I had not realized that for me, Christmas was all about my Dad. It reminds me, in retrospect, of the Calvin and Hobbes cartoon where Calvin is lying in bed shouting "There'd better not be any monsters under my bed!" with the response from under the bed of "Nope, no monsters down here!" When queried by Hobbes, Calvin explains matter-of-factly: "They lie, I lie."

 And so it has been with Christmas in our family. Dad's innocent looking around the ceiling as we noted that Santa wrote with distinctly Dad-like handwriting, which over the years turned into gifts from one or the other of Santa's reindeer, or when he couldn't think of a better idea, the aggregate of "various elves." The handwriting never changed, but somehow impersonating Blitzen was less sacrilegious. The under-his-breath cussing while he wrapped presents or attempted to assemble them. Dad's varied attempts to make it look like a reindeer had taken a bite out of the apple we left by the hearth. The hiding places Dad used to stash presents, and his innocent attempts to cover for owning some of the stuff we occasionally found. "Oh, no, I'm reading that book! It's fascinating!" *blink blink.*

 And the highlight of the season, at least for me, was looking for a gift that would get *that* response from Dad, either of immediate fascination (physics books tended to get this kind of response) or amusement (the tissue box with the porcelain nose, where you pulled the tissues out of a nostril was a shining moment for me). And his joy at seeing a gift hit home, as well. It was about having That Moment with Dad. The moment of recognition, appreciation, and love.

 And in recent years, as his mobility waned and he couldn't do it himself, it also became about service; about being Dad's eyes and hands, looking for a gift for my stepmom, which was a special treat for me as well. Colluding together on what he had in mind, and then sneaking it in to show him before wrapping it on his behalf, again our little secret.

 We tried so hard last year, carrying Christmas up to his room, bringing the intimate exchange of gifts to him, "his" gift to her within arms' reach for him, and taking turns sitting with him as he ate dinner, so that he'd be surrounded by family even when he couldn't make it down the stairs to join us at the table, waiting until he'd gone to sleep before I could let go of the thought that he was up there, listening to our dinner, feeling alone. 

This year, by contrast, was a marvel of perfect logistics. We came together, and like a dance we all knew perfectly, we all knew exactly when to move to the gift exchange, our respective parts in the preparation of dinner, what to expect at dinner, the give and take of family stories and jokes and teasing. The littlest ones began to learn the family ways of "putting your fork and knife at 10 minutes to 4," and under what circumstances one can be excused from the table, and no, playing a game on the iPad doesn't count. Staying to make sure that the house is put right at the end, with the careful washing of dishes and putting away of pots and pans. Yesterday was perfect, except that the joke at the heart of it -- the secret -- was gone.