Christmas Without a Tree - Homeless, But Not Without Insight

It was moving day again; eighteen moves in two years as Rebecca recalled putting the last of her possessions in a sturdy box. Rebecca and her Mother had lived together until her Mother decided to move to a retirement complex. Her Mother's health was poor and Rebecca who had tended her Mother for several years was feeling a need to be on her own - driven by inertia she didn't understand - so at the time it seemed like an appropriate solution for both mother and daughter.

At nineteen Rebecca was wise beyond her years, even though that's not always synonymous with maturity. Beginning a new life with no savings or work is a scary thing to face, yet Rebecca welcomed change. In her immaturity she searched for something outside herself to validate her youngness in understanding, rather than garner knowledge before engaging in situations greater than her reasoning.

Several people had offered her a place to stay but usually not for long. Rebecca had a vision and even though life pulled her in different directions, she knew the importance of keeping that vision alive. To her credit she built mental muscles so as not to do harm to others and learned the value of caring for herself in every possible way.

With another Christmas just around the corner Rebecca could not help but remember move number sixteen. It was almost Christmas, she had a temporary place to stay, but it was obvious the arrangement was not working. Rebecca was asked to move out before the New Year but had her friend's apartment to her self during the holidays.

With festive lights and trimmings and holiday cheer all around, she was experiencing something many people around the world experience every Christmas - loneliness, and she silently wept.

As she dressed that Christmas Eve in her finest clothes she wanted to be around families who were together even though they were total strangers, so she set out on that chilly December afternoon for a local church to observe Christmas services. Rebecca knew that sometimes you feel closer to people you know nothing about than those you have known for a lifetime. As she sat in the church pew watching people enter the exquisitely decorated sanctuary, she couldn't help wonder if they truly knew the value of what they had.

A light snow had begun to fall as she left the church. The crisp, early evening air blew all around her as she made her way to her Mother's apartment. Earlier in the month Rebecca put up a small artificial tree for her Mother. In previous years they had designated it as the traveling tree. When mother and daughter lived together, they were fortunate to have a large evergreen tree that friends would gather round and help decorate every year. Since no one they knew was to feel alone, the traveling tree was offered to those who might have gone without.

Around nine o'clock Rebecca went back to the empty apartment where she had been staying. There was no holiday cheer to be felt there, and she knew the reasons why. Feeling slightly sorry for herself, she knew she had to snap out of it quickly as she changed clothes and went to the kitchen to make a late snack. Amongst boxes and all kinds of clutter in a room where there was a small television for her to watch, she placed her Christmas feast in front of a chair by a large window on the top floor of the high-rise building she was living in at the time.

All at once Rebecca's spirits rose as she looked out over the gently falling snow that by now had covered everything in its path. The city lights twinkled along the horizon, and she could see a few apartment windows here and there, lit-up with strands of blinking white and colored lights - but most windows dark without any sign of life.

While scanning the television she found an old film that had already begun. With the lights in the cluttered room dimmed she began her Christmas feast.

"Oh how I would like to see a Christmas tree in this room right now," she thought.

For a few brief moments Rebecca felt a sense of great sorrow born of the circumstances and consequences of her life. As she put down her hot cocoa and looked across the courtyard between the high-rise buildings, with the snow gently falling in the cold night air, a magnificently decorated and lit Christmas tree appeared in an otherwise darkened room. It took Rebecca's breath away.

"Oh how lovely," she whispered. "A Christmas tree just for me!"

And in that moment she realized that there didn't need to be a Christmas tree in her room - it was already there deep inside her. She might have been without a physical place she called home, but that didn't imply she was without precious insight. When the tree appeared in that darkened window across the courtyard, it could not have been in a better place at that particular moment in time - for Christmas is a state of being - not a place were it is held or exhibited. The essence of Christmas is the space where anything is possible when first welcomed and understood in the heart and mind.

Karin Anderssen is a current contributor to the information website Master Life Instructions @ http://www.master-life-instructions.com/. She has been writing for adults and children for over ten years basing articles and children's fables and stories on her understandings of metaphysics and the humanities. The intent behind her writings is to encourage and support authentic, heartfelt dialogue between generations.