4 Days (better make that 3!): Eleanor Rigby and Father McKenzie

This year, in lieu of our usual Christmas get together, my book club, The Key West Girls decided to go Christmas Caroling. Three of our members have fantastic voices and the fourth one (me) makes up for a lack of talent with volume, enthusiasm and a flair for ad-libbing and ringing bells. The folks we chose to visit last night -two men and two women- are our friends, neighbors and  co-workers, all getting up into their "years" but living fairly healthy and independent lives. For some, their families and spouses are deceased. Maybe it’s hard for them to get out and drive. Maybe over the years their lives congealed into a way that left them not a lot of other options at this point in their lives. It reminds me of the Beatles’ song, Eleanor Rigby,  where Father McKenzie and Eleanor Rigby live parallel lonely lives right beside each other. If only they'd reached out to one another. "It’s a shame,” said one of my KWG girlfriends last night, “that these people can’t get together and at least be each other’s companions. That would mean so much…”

And she's right, of course...

"Ah, look at all the only people..."

• Mildred is one of the girl’s neighbors and lives “alone” with 14 cats, if that is possible. You can tell she loves cats because her house is filled with an assortment of feline knick-knacks. She was busy cleaning her house from top to bottom in preparation for her family, including her ex-husband, to come visit for the holidays. In the living room, all the newly vacuumed sofas and chairs were covered with all her spare sheets and blankets to keep the surfaces clean until the gusts arrived. She smiled brightly at us even as she stepped away from us mid- song to take a phone call.

• Anne is a friend and summerhouse neighbor of my sister’s and lives in a beautifully appointed house in town. Although she’s in her 80’s, Anne is a smart and funny and retains the girlie nature of someone half her age. She recently had surgery for a break in her clavicle due to bone cancer. She loved having the four of us ladies over to visit for wine, cheese straws and teatime tassies, served for probably the first time in my life, on an actual “Tea Table“. Anne clasped her hands together in delight and seemed genuinely touched by our songs as she sat in her wing chair while we stood in front of her singing in what was probably one of the prettiest spaces we had ever seen.

• Dave is in his 90’s and a more sharp and witty person you have never seen. He was ready for us with eggnog and cider and the biggest bottle of Jack Daniels I had ever seen. Dave is one of those men who grow smaller with age and as he began to drag the big bottle from the bar, I swear I was afraid it was going to tip him over. I, who am half his age got his name thoroughly mixed up for the entire duration of our visit called him repeatedly “Bob.Bob“, more loudly than normal, I suppose because of my general assumption that anyone over age 80 is hard of hearing. Finally one of the KWGB’s said , “His name is Dave! WHY do you keep calling him BOB???” As we said our goodbyes, I tried to cover my tracks saying “Bye Bob” and gave him a wink, but I think he caught on to my act. In fact, I am SURE he did! The ironic thing is that Bob, I means DAVE is actually Jewish, but he LOVES Christmas Carols. He sang along with us, mouthing most of the words to Silent Night and Go Tell it on the Mountain.

• Mr. Edmund is my boss at work, but foremost he is my friend. He is staying at our company’s hotel recuperating from hip surgery a few weeks ago. Mr.E is doing great except for the fact that he has tired of 24 hour room service and is simply ready to go home. Mr. E is one of these folks that when you visit, you KNOW you’re going to have to eat something. We visited and listened to his old stories over an assortment of olives, cheese, hummus, calimari and spinach dip and pita breads before asking, an hour later, if he wanted us to sing. Mr. E has been lost in the past a bit of late, dreaming of his time spent in the 40’s at WW2’s Battle of the Bulge and during the earlier phases of his career. Instead of a Christmas Carol, he pulled out a tattered piece of paper I printed for him from the computer with the lyrics to, “The Way We Were ( Memories)”. He is infatuated with that song and has made quite a production of late ,saying he wants it sung at his funeral. This is a notion all of us dismiss, saying ( and hoping) he will be around for many more years. He sang along with us ,as well, and in fact, we recieved our only encore of the evening when he had us sing it again before we left. When we sang too softly, he raised his hands towards us like a conductor, indicating that we should sing more loudly and with more passion. He loved it, and as we walked out, he said "This is something you'll NEVER forget!" I think he meant the words to the song, but it could have been the evening or the calamari,any of the above.

It really was quite a special and unforgettable evening of the holiday-type or otherwise. What initially impressed  me is that these are just FOUR PEOLPE and in Greensboro, where I live, is a really BIG place. There must be hundreds of folks where you live, too that don’t care about a Christmas Card or a gift. All they want is a visit, to talk and joke, to sit down and connect with someone.

And that's when I realized the REAL irony, more than a Cat Lady or a lonely widow in a big house. More than singing Christmas Carols to a Jewish man or "The Way We Were" to someone to whom none of us had shared  "that kind" of relationship. These "folks" are not just out there- in our neighborhoods and workplaces, they are in our own homes, too. In fact, they are "us". It is in the act of reaching “out” to them, we realize just how much we need that sense of connection too.

And throughout our lives, we  try to fill our loneliness with so much of the wrong thing. At  Christmastime, we get so carried away with our own holiday agendas: the shopping, the decorating, even organizing a Christmas Caroling event. And while these activities are important parts of how we celebrate our holidays, they are largely symbolic and pale in comparison to the important things we choose to do everyday life of which we are mostly unawares. It is easy to say, “Oh look at all these lonely people out there…” but by doing that, we miss the point that it’s not just an “out there” problem. It’s an “in here” problem as well, and is something everyone feels inside that makes us long to connect.

The greatest gift we can ever bestow on ourselves and our  fellow human beings is to simply open our hearts, open the doors of our homes and theirs and walk right into each other's lives. If we can share a cup of coffee or tea, or even just a smile, then that’s the greatest privilege we have of simply being alive.  Merry

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays, to you allM