The song is part of my early childhood memories. In thinking about it, it’s a strange song to remember from childhood. But then I realized that the hit version was released a short time after my birth. Given that both of my parents always listened to music and my father tended to sing along, it’s no wonder that the Elvis Presley version of Blue Christmas is a song I remember fondly.
Written by Billy Hayes and Jay W. Johnson in the 1940’s, the lyrics to this song of unrequited love are simple and touching:
I’ll have a blue Christmas without you
I’ll be so blue just thinking about you
Decorations of red on a green Christmas tree
Won’t be the same dear, if you’re not here with me
And when those blue snowflakes start falling
That’s when those blue memories start calling
You’ll be doin’ all right, with your Christmas of white
But I’ll have a blue, blue, blue, blue Christmas
Over the last ten years or so, a blue Christmas has come to refer to those who experience Christmas in the midst of loss and grief. For many people, no other time is as tender after a loved one’s passing as the winter holiday season. The many happy memories shared over holidays past become reminders that the loved one is no longer present. Blue Christmas’s don’t just come the first year after the death of a loved one; for some people, the holiday is simply never the same.
As I prepare for my home for Christmas this year, I find myself overwhelmed with emotion from my mother’s death earlier this year. As I unwrap ornaments I remember her hanging on the Christmas tree , hear Christmas songs she used to sing, and bake from recipes handed down from her, I confront again her absence in my life. Similarly, I find that I can neither sing nor listen to the familiar carol, Angels We Have Heard on High, without tears welling up in my eyes. While my father passed ten years ago, when I hear the carol, I hear him singing it as he did when driving, taking a shower, or just walking through the house during the Christmas season.
While I look forward to sharing this Christmas with my family and close friends, and while we will celebrate and make new memories during this holiday season, the sparkle of silver and gold will also have a tinge of blue. Perhaps as we grow older, this is a natural part of how the holidays evolve. Much like the process of wine aging over time, the fresh, tart juice mellows and is enriched by flavors that deepen it.
Indeed, the Christmas story is marked by both light and darkness, joy and pain, good news and great fear. It was on a cold, dark night when the star appeared. Joy to the world rang out as a young girl gave birth alone in a hillside cave. Angels sang of glad tidings while the people lived in fear. The story of Christmas is one filled with ambiguities and contradictions. In this way, it’s not a children’s story but one that reflects the hardship, complexity, and duality of life.
As my experience of Christmas takes on stronger hues of blue, the red and green, the silver and gold also remain. The holidays are not diminished so much as they are expanded to include Christmas past and Christmas present ….while I live into Christmas future, which surely will become even richer in color and meaning.
So it is that I come into this holiday season thankful for the sacred memories of love and joy shared with loved ones now departed and once again wish them peace: yes, peace on earth and in the realm where they now rest. And with joy I celebrate the gift of life born anew with loved ones who this holiday grace my life with their presence.
