Mom left us in April and youngest sister Cheryl departed for the Spirit World in August, so we entered this Holiday season on somewhat of a somber note and with two very large and very empty spots in our hearts and at the family table at our two Thanksgivings, Nunnowa, Shinnecock Tribal Thanksgiving on Nov. 18, and regular National Thanksgiving, Nov 25.
Now we move forward into the Season of Lights, our life cycle continuing, Creator allowing our presence here to celebrate a holiday — as we will, and as best we can. The 74-foot Rockefeller Center tree blazed with some 30,000 lights Nov. 30, Hanukkah candles appeared in windows Dec. 1 and our Tribal Christmas Tree (14-feet now?) was lit Monday night. Our tree is alive, we are happy to say, transported a few years ago from the late Jim "Uncle Hook" Smith's yard and replanted at the Tribal Flagpole Memorial. Uncle Hook's tree is perfectly shaped, aging graciously, stretching up into the heavens right along with us.
This year, we'll be spending Christmas at home. The grandkids are coming — an 11-year-old grandson and two teenage granddaughters — and we are in ultra-organized mode, checking off items on a to-do list. This mode seldom occurs around here, we might add.
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House, halfway cleaned. No check yet. Other half is waiting.
Presents for hubby/grandpa complete. Check. Did that first so we don't get busy and forget.
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A few presents for wifey/grandma in case hubby/grandpa gets busy and forgets. Just a few. Check.
Disgorge refrigerator of Thanksgiving leftovers. Check.
Remember Mom's birthday, Dec. 5. Check.
Took an evergreen Holiday wreath to Shinnecock cemetery and placed it between Mom and Dad for them to share on her birthday. Check.
Sister Joan took poinsettias for the graves of Cheryl and oldest sister Carmen. During the Sacred Season and at all times, we are to remember loved ones who have gone before us with thoughts, deeds and prayers. Check, Mom. Check, Family.
Still to be done: mop and polish other half of house; straighten out mess in linen closet; clear a path in the back junk room; pull out tree from storage and set it up. (We use artificial. It's safer and greener. Every tree we save is a plus for the survival of mankind — or something.) Shop, wrap, cook, maintain semblance of order, have some fun, take kids into the city. Everyone should see New York City at least once in a lifetime.
The holiday hasn't arrived, nor have the kids, but we are excited and exhausted just thinking about it all.
One of these years, we tell ourselves — as we go with our feet aching from one pre-holiday retail sale to the next — we are going to return to the old way of Christmas on Shinnecock. "Old way" meaning pre Walmart, K-Mart and Macy's; pre factory made toys and games; back to a time when everything was handmade. Of course that would mean, if we're going to be purists about this, that we have to learn how to make constructive items, and give up the modern conveniences — the car, the phone, the TV and the PC — and resort to wearing, traditional clothing — buckskins and furs for this time of year — and eating only foods we've grown, fished, trapped, or arrowed.
It's a plan. We're going back to the old way. Next year we'll communicate by yodeling, make cakes from scratch and not touch a single Mrs. Smith frozen pie. Plus, we'll have the grandkids build us a horno oven for baking in the backyard, just like they do at the pueblos.
Sure we will. Absolutely. Happy Holidays.
