I’m going to take a leap of faith here and say that most kids love Christmas. 
 
First, school is out for two whole weeks.  Second, there are presents.  Don’t forget Christmas trees heavy with ornaments; dazzling light displays, and singing along to songs of the season.  Oh, and the food:  creamy egg nog and smooth chocolate fudge, rich butter cookies, and other astonishingly decadent goodies that appear only at this time
of year.
 
I hated Christmas when I was a child.        
 
Not only that, it wasn’t until I reached my 30s that I was finally able to make peace with what’s supposed to be the most joyous holiday of the year.
 
The reason is simple. 
 
I was a Jewish girl who grew up in a thoroughly Christian neighborhood.  
 
Despite these obvious demographics, as well as the fact that my family was what I today call “California Jews”—i.e. undeniably not hard core when it came to practicing our religion—my parents refused to bring a tree, and none of its accoutrements, into our home.  That included presents.    
 
But perhaps because my mom and dad also understood that there was no escape from this all-encompassing month—Christmas was, and still is, everywhere—we did acknowledge the holiday.
 
In a decidedly oddball sort of way. 
 
This meant that my mother spent weeks baking dozens upon dozens of butter cookies with cookie cutters shaped like Christmas trees and silver bells.  Strangely, my brother and I also had photos taken of us in the lap of a big store Santa Claus, although we both knew that he wasn’t magical and requests to him would go unanswered.  Mom mailed out Christmas cards, too, and even took a tiny glass tree out of storage that sat on top of our television set for
most of December.
 
There’s more to this schizophrenia.
 
Next to the little tree, my parents placed a Hanukah menorah. 
 
Sometimes we would light candles, but if the hour got too late and we forgot, well, we’d make up for that the next night. If we did remember, we still never recited any prayers beforehand.  You’ve probably guessed by now that there weren’t any gifts to acknowledge the Festival of Lights.  
 
Instead, in those times before Black Friday and Cyber Monday, my mom and I would hit department store blowout sales immediately after December 25.
 
We’d wind up hauling a few shopping bags full of dresses, skirts and blouses home. So, if a classmate happened to ask what I had received for Christmas, it was a no brainer to say those clothes had been under the tree.
 
This tactic worked well until fourth grade. 
 
That year, long before diversity became every school’s mantra, my class made Christmas ornaments.  Bright white Styrofoam spheres were passed out, along with sequins and pins.  But when I proudly brought the decoration home, my mother had a fit.  She even called the principal to loudly complain that not everyone at the school had a Christmas tree, and not everyone celebrated the birth of Jesus Christ, thank you very much. 
 
Now even my teacher knew how different, and somehow, how ashamed, I felt.     
 
The years passed and I left home for college, joined a circus, returned to college and snagged a journalism degree, then moved to New York City to write.  With the eyes of an adult, I could now see that for millions—perhaps even the majority of Americans—Christmas wasn’t about any particular religion (although for millions of others, including my Christian husband, it is).    Rather, it was much more of a time to reflect, and act on, good will, peace and kindness. 
 
Still, it somehow didn’t feel right to buy a Christmas tree. 
 
But it was also pointless for me to have a menorah since I hadn’t been inside a synagogue for decades. 
 
Then—and this took a few more years—I had an epiphany.    
 
I realized that even though I’d felt like an outsider for decades, I still longed to feel the sweetness and joy of the season. 
 
And now, I could.  Yes, there was finally a way to be okay, even happy, when Christmastime rolled around.     
 
I could create my very own holiday template, and with it, my very own holiday traditions. 
 
One of the first things I did was buy a tree. 
 
By then, I had also learned how the Christmas tree came to be—and that it had absolutely nothing to do with the
​birth of Christ. 
 
In fact, bringing nature inside has long been part of a Pagan, pre-Christian ritual that saw its adherents garnishing their homes with evergreen shrubs.   (Cutting down entire trees would have been considered far too destructive to the beauty of nature—which this early religion was devoted to.)  Indeed, one way of recognizing the important mid-winter holiday was to display the scrubs, which often included decorating them with bits of glass and metal.  It wasn’t until centuries later that Christians added a baby in a manger and stamped the celebration as theirs.   
 
Eventually, too, I baked cookies, but not every year and not nearly in the quantities my mother had.  Sometimes I even put a string of outdoor lights around my doorway.  With the wisdom and self-confidence that comes with age, I knew that this act had nothing to do with worshipping a man born in Bethlehem.  But it had everything to do with saying the lights simply made me happy.     
 
So it was that by the time I had my baby girl, I knew her December 25 would bear no resemblance to the ones I only wanted to forget. 
 
She would have a big tree, and there would be presents underneath it.  There would certainly be many ornaments, including one acknowledging her first Christmas.  And there would be lots of photos of her on display, all wearing cutie patootie outfits topped by a Santa hat. 
 
Most of all, I wanted my daughter to experience one of childhood’s very best days of the entire year.
 
And that was Christmas morning,
 
She would likely have a hard time going to sleep, restlessly dreaming of reindeer hoofs on our roof.  She would definitely wake up very early, and then run to the Christmas tree in the living room. There, she might find a new bicycle, and lots of other gifts lovingly wrapped, waiting for her tiny hands to tear apart. 
 
On my end, I couldn’t wait to watch.        
 
And because of who I am, and where I came from, yes, we would have a menorah. 
 
But it was my turn  to do it my way, so that meant that this candelabra would have its own special spot, with small dreidels and a special cloth, festooned with Stars of David, accessorizing the area.  There would be full-on Hebrew prayers every evening for those nine days, too, with my daughter lighting the candles every time.  I would also learn to make potato pancakes from scratch, served with homemade applesauce and sour cream.   Sometimes we would read the story of how Hanukah began.  And there would be presents here, too, mostly books.   
 
There are plenty of other folks just like me—people who have mindfully chosen to not repeat the Christmas playbook of their childhoods.    
 
Some prefer poinsettia bushes instead of a tree, while others always give to a favorite charity rather than exchange presents.  Kwanza is now in the mix, and I also have Christian friends who believe that celebrating Hanukah is pretty cool, too.  It heartens me as well to see many others who define this season as one of community service, and do that walk with grace.     
 
Really, it all comes down to this:  you can pick and choose, add and subtract, and create your own December rituals.  Make it big, or make it small.  Make it traditional, or create a new spin or two. 
 
Most of all, make it fit you.    
 
How did you celebrate the holidays as a child, and how about now? I’d love to hear your stories!    

Here’s what I know about clichés.

They can be silly, overused and sometimes even nonsensical.  But nearly all of these one-sentence thoughts contain at least a grain of truth—which is probably why so many of them remain part of our everyday language.  

I also think that a lot of us identify with at least one of these old timey sayings. 

Mine is this:  Every cloud has a silver lining.

(For those not skilled in metaphors, the phrase means that even when life’s circumstances appear overwhelming and hopeless, something positive, sooner or later, will eventually emerge from the experience.)

But to arrive at my happy ending to the sentence, it’s important, first, to write about the cloud that hit me, literally, 13 years ago this month.

My daughter was four years old, and I was a widow who had relocated us five months earlier from Los Angeles.  Driving home, I decided to pull into a favorite produce stand right off the two-lane blacktop that connected my new address to the bigger city a few miles away.  My little girl was nodding off behind me, safe and snug in a plush car seat.

I stopped, waiting to make a left turn. 

That’s when another car—zooming at 65 miles per hour behind mine—slammed into me.    

Most folks in bad car accidents remember that the seconds during and after impact slow down, and I was no exception.
 
Taking it all in herky-jerky, stop action movements, I remember seeing the vehicle that had just badly rear ended my car fly over me, then spin and come to rest upside down. 

By this time, I was calling my child’s name and kept calling until she answered.  But it was only after I unhooked my seat belt to get to her that I noticed that neither my hands nor arms would move. 

Both were clutching the steering wheel, but scarily, I also couldn’t feel them.  It was around then that a young girl (later, l learned she was a new, 16-year-old driver) emerged from the wrecked car in front of mine.  She had cut a finger.  That was it.  Her only words to me were these: “I didn’t see you until I hit you.”  Within minutes, more cars had stopped, and other bystanders magically appeared from both sides of the road to also help.

I thought I was fine, but upon the urging of medical personnel, I allowed myself to be taken to a hospital.  Because my child was beside me, I pretended that I wasn’t all that scared, and that everything would very soon be all right.

Indeed, after looking me over, I was released that night.
 
Yup, I was pretty shaken up and I was pretty sore.  The car was totaled, too.  But my daughter was fine.  All in all, I thought we had dodged a pretty big bullet.

Then, not very long after, the pain began.

Excruciating and unyielding, it traveled from my neck to my back and shoulders, and next made its way up again.  Prescription pills took the edge off, but they never entirely kept the immense aching at bay.  My hands and fingers were now also weak, and would drop things without warning.  And although it sounds funny, one elbow began to hurt—a lot.  This was when I discovered that elbows are used constantly, from opening doors and washing dishes, to working on computers and preparing meals.

I wasn’t about to submit to surgery (which offered no guarantees anyway), and while massages and acupuncture helped, those treatments clearly weren’t enough.  So it was that after an MRI revealed a nasty case of whiplash, my physician suggested physical therapy.

I had a different idea. 

Yoga.

I wasn’t a complete stranger to this ancient practice that, while not a religion, teaches one to experience inner peace via a series of imaginative, stationary poses.  Simple meditation and breathing techniques are also part of being “on the mat.”
​
Indeed, I’d taken a class here and there in Southern California, but found myself dreadfully out of place because the focus was on maintaining a skinny body, as well as encouraging competition with other classmates.  The element of breathing, which I later learned is so much of what yoga is about, was barely mentioned. 
   
But necessity is the mother of invention (another cliché!), and besides, I had now done some research on this healing technique, which some believe began about 10,000 years ago.   
 
These days, it turns out that there’s a whole lot of science behind yoga and pain management.

One study, detailed in a Harvard Medical School publication, concludes that when it comes to back pain, yoga can be successfully substituted, often with better results, for traditional Western stretching and therapy.  The fact that yoga is a relatively low cost option (often under $10 per class) , and is also offered in so many places—aside from yoga centers, it’s everywhere from churches and mobile home parks, to park and recreation centers and even on the beach—makes the practice appealing as well.    

Another Harvard article says that yoga alleviates stress and anxiety, two emotions I was feeling a lot more acutely after the accident.  Specifically, yoga can reduce heart rate, lower blood pressure and ease respiration.  There’s also evidence that a consistent yoga practice can help increase heart rate variability, an indicator of the body’s ability to respond to stress in a healthier way. 
    
This all sounded pretty darn good to me.

So, armed with a new knowledge and a new attitude, I reentered yoga with a gentle class twice a week. 

But unlike the perfect bodies of Los Angeles, I was now with a group of women, some older than me, who joked about being “the walking wounded.”  A few had been in accidents like me; some had fibromyalgia, and others were simply feeling the aches and pains of age. 

Every class began in folding chairs, and always, there were props.  Blankets, straps, and hard rubber blocks helped make the asanas—the physical movements, or poses, in yoga—that much easier. 

I especially liked what our teacher said when I first began.   “Yoga is not supposed to hurt,” she said.  “If you’re hurting, stop.  We’ll find another way.”

It didn’t happen overnight, but slowly, the daily throbbing began to dissipate.  

Today, while my hands still occasionally let go of whatever I’m holding, and my neck is not all that strong, I’m no longer in pain.
     
Of course, some of the healing had to do with giving my body permission to mend in its own way, and too, in its own time. 
But I’m also positive that the lessening of my pain was accelerated by a consistent yoga practice. 

In fact, I know this is true because whenever I’ve missed a couple of weeks of class, my back and elbow start letting me know that they need a little attention.   
   
I practice at a studio closer to home now, and sometimes, even feel confident enough to participate in a strong beginner level class.  This venue also offers restorative yoga, a type of yoga that envelopes one in a profoundly deep state of relaxation that I’ve been unable to duplicate any other way.  Lately, I’ve also attended a monthly event that adds essential oils and light massage to that already heavenly experience.   

I don’t know if my body will ever be as strong as it was prior to the car crash.

But I’m also certain that if I had never gotten into that horrific wreck, I also never would have found my way to a healthy yoga practice… which has not only brought new friends to my world, but also introduced me to a way of moving that fuels my entire being.

And that, I know, makes this silver lining A Very Good Thing. 

How about you?  Whether it’s about clichés and yoga, or a life experience that came to mind with this post, I’d love to hear your stories!  
​
ps. If you haven’t yet seen this astonishing yoga transformation video (it has more than 12 million hits), check it out here, at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qX9FSZJu448.   

(A note: not my usual sort of post, the original version of this essay spilled out of me in about one hour a few years back.  The shattering event detailed here happened on November 10, 1999, and continues to profoundly impact both my daughter and myself in a myriad of ways.)
 
Sometimes it all seems like yesterday, but no, it has instead been well over a decade ago.
 
In fact, it has been 16 years since The Awful Knock.
 
 It was 4:19 in the morning and my heart was pounding as I listened to the fist on my front door—banging, unrelenting, and as you’ll soon see, inevitable.  The house, just steps from trendy Fairfax Avenue, is what Hollywood realtors like to call cozy, just a little bungalow really, and I started praying please, please, please don’t let the baby wake up. 
 
Oh, and one more thing: my partner, my love, was not there comforting me.  Indeed, he wasn’t there at all.  Do you want to know why?
 
Well then.  I was the woman who had been keeping a secret—this wonderful man who had swept me off my feet so many years before had now morphed into someone I barely recognized.  This new and very scary person had terrifying mood changes, often with barely a glimmer of advance notice.  At best, they left me unsettled and at worst, saw me literally running for cover. 
 
Once he smashed a rocking chair against our living room wall, just inches from the baby’s head.  Another time, it was an industrial sized flashlight, but that was on another wall and the baby was playing in a different room.  Then there was the afternoon he told me that life really wasn’t painful at all—words said as he placed a knife on the baby’s tongue. 
 
There were times, too, when everything turned topsy-turvy: he would isolate himself inside the garage for hours, weeping inconsolably, writing notes about what sort of poison he should take.  Yet over and over again, he swore he would never, could never, hurt me or the baby, whom he said he loved more than I could ever imagine.
 
 He also said he hated himself more than I could ever imagine.
 
The night of The Awful Knock, he had left home several hours earlier after an argument so dumb I can’t even remember what it was about.  But he had gently closed the front door behind him, leaving his wallet in plain view.
 
Now, opening the door, I saw a woman in uniform, but she wasn’t a sheriff’s deputy from our West Hollywood station.  She didn’t appear to be wearing an LAPD uniform either.  Somehow, I already knew who she was before she quietly announced that she worked for the county coroner’s office.  I can’t describe it any other way: my voice instantly left my body. 
 
I waited what seemed like a long time but was really only a moment.  “He’s dead, isn’t he?” I said, more of a statement than a question. 
 
“Yes,” she said softly.  “I am so sorry.” 
 
The man who had just shot a bullet into his right temple would leave an irrevocable void.
 
Once, he had been my best friend, my playmate, and my biggest fan.  He was also really funny, so much smarter than he thought, and an engaging storyteller.  I knew I wanted to know him better after he came over to replace an appliance part, just a few weeks after we had met.  We had been quietly sitting and talking on my kitchen floor when my almost-always-persnickety cat sidled into the room.  Giving him one look, she then laid on her back next to him, flirty, all paws aloft, purring loudly. 
 
His favorite word was “fun”—as in, “What should we do this weekend that will be the most fun?” So, he took me to the very best place to fly a kite in Los Angeles County—he had thoroughly researched it years before.  Then there were those starry nights in an abandoned miner’s cabin overlooking Death Valley, first pushing boulders out of the road with bare hands in order to make it in.  We also walked through Hollywood in the dead of night—but literally underground, strolling for miles through the newly built sewer line he had discovered after he had stumbled upon an open manhole.  One evening, he was astounded to learn I’d never tasted a quince, much less heard of one.  “We are going out now and I am going to teach you how to buy the perfect quince!” he announced. 
 
And with his flickering turquoise eyes, lean frame and polite “Nice to meet you Ma’am” smile, he was also—my own mother breathlessly whispered this in my ear upon meeting him—movie star handsome. And yes, there were times, a lot of times, when he was a remarkable father.  I still have the snapshots and the sweet notes to prove it.  In fact, while I teasingly called him “The Best Man in the Land,” I meant every word.
 
But my good fortune ran out when his happy moods became bitter and self-loathing. 
​
He hated his work, he hated his friends, and he hated his life.  Our much-wanted baby could bring him out of his reverie, but only for snatched moments.  One night he kneeled beside her crib for hours, watching her dream, wondering out loud if she would remember him. 
 
No one really knew how to help. 
 
When I finally suggested seeing a doctor, perhaps taking medication—after all, what about those miracle drugs?—his refusals were loud, defiant and adamant.  He could take care of himself, he said.  Much, much later, I found out just how he had: buying pills from street sources and then washing them down with cheap alcohol.
 
He never did it to get high—only to stay even and only to anesthetize the pain.
 
Afterwards, during those awful first few months, the baby saved my life. 
 
Of course, all I really wanted to do was stay curled up in bed, but every parent to a toddler knows this isn’t an option.  I also felt guilty that I had not done enough and guilty, too, because I was so angry at him for leaving me.  There were even days, but mostly nights, when I wanted to join him because I loved him that much.  I made my living working in network television, but having that sort of responsibility – the ability to function on a daily basis—was now out of the question. 
 
Thankfully, most of the time I felt as numb and frozen as an ice cube, and glad of it.
 
Eventually, I figured out why he had left his wallet on the table when he said goodbye. 
 
Inside a secret compartment were five pictures he had laminated of the baby, ones he had never shown me.  I knew, knew, he would never have been able to kill himself that night if he had looked at any of those images, even for a moment.  At the memorial service, his ex-wife provided another revelation: his love for our child and for me, she said, had kept him alive.  Years ago, she added, he had talked to her about killing himself.
 
 There were other surprises. 
 
Until his death, I had no idea that one in five people who seek no treatment for their depression commit suicide.  This seems like an astounding number.  I was also stunned by the sheer numbers of those whose lives are touched—derailed is a better word—by suicide.  A mom in my daughter’s playgroup told me her father had killed himself.  My realtor told me his grandmother had done the same.  A friend told me about her high school boyfriend, and another friend told me about a business colleague. 
 
Yet so often, these deaths go unspoken. 
 
Why?  Is it shame?  Maybe.  Is it because it is unthinkable for someone to do away with himself in one fell swoop?  Maybe.  Is it because survivors believe there is a black mark against them?  Maybe. 
 
I do know, for a very long time, whenever a stranger asked, it was easier to say he had died in a car accident.  I also learned that when I told the truth, there was only silence.  No one really knows what to say, although one man told me he should have eaten peanuts—after all, he said, they cure depression. How does one respond to a well-meaning idiot?
 
Nearly three years after his passing—years in which I faithfully went to weekly counseling and years that I now barely remember—my daughter and I moved to a new house.  The town was also new and several hundred miles away.  Then I relocated again after marrying a man who, immediately after proposing, asked if he could have the honor of adopting my daughter. 
 
It is a clean and happy and loving slate, and I have certainly moved on in so many ways. And here, settled in a place my long ago love never visited, never even knew about, there is not even the tiniest reminder of him. 
 
I like it this way. 
 
So now I have finally decided to do something else. 
 
I am coming out of hiding.  I am going to tell the truth.  I will tell everyone who asks that he loved life so much, that he loved me so much, and oh, how he loved our child to the point of giddiness.
 
And I will then tell them this: he was depressed and he refused help. He got worse and worse, letting no one in. And then, mindfully and purposefully, he killed himself. 
 
Finally, I will tell them that I did the best I could. 
 
It has taken many, many years since The Awful Knock, but I now know this, too:  his suicide had everything to do with him and nothing to do with me. 
 
My only part was that I loved him.