This window reveal should probably come with a trigger warning as its subject matter includes grief and loss but it is also a celebration of our memories and the images that come to mind when we see an empty chair at our Christmas table. Typing that phrase makes me think of the song from Les Miserables - 'Empty Chairs at Empty Tables.' Each time I hear that the emotion gets to me - the loss of people we hold dear, the missed opportunities that they could have had but also the 'phantom shadows at the window' represents those moments when we least expect it, when their faces come to mind.
The photograph at the start of this blog post was taken two days ago. We had decided to visit a National Trust property that my late mother-in-law, Yvonne, had always enjoyed going to at this time of the year. Today would have been her birthday and for several years she would visit this property as a birthday treat and a way to get into the festive spirit, looking at the way the place was always beautifully decorated. We walked around the house on Sunday, taking in all the colours, lights and atmosphere and just know that she would have loved it there.
It is quite a few years since she had managed to get there, I am sure her last visit there was pre-pandemic. The trouble is that we don't know in the moment of doing something that it might be the last time that we get to do it. Perhaps if we did, we would cherish the moment more closely. Today's poem considers how little seemingly ordinary moments can move from being everyday, mundane or expected parts of our routines, to slipping out of our ongoing experiences and then become merely echoes of the last times that we did them. I dedicate it today to Yvonne.
The Last Time
We seldom note the passing of our lives -
the 'last times'
The moments that, for so long mundane, pass by,
Shifted unseen to nostalgia-dipped memories
that sit just out of reach,
The ordinary items that we never knew the value of
until we realise we have had them for the last time.
The bad joke shared on a walk with Dad,
whilst humour still stood within his grasp,
No longer here to raise his pint as I roll my eyes,
or hurry along to the next part of my day.
The Sunday lunch around the table
when the kids were small,
the struggle over vegetables,
the chatter with grandparents,
replaced with shifts in the kitchen,
empty place mats,
snatched calls and fleeting texts.
The last family holiday with the four of us
bickering here and there about what to do next
but together, all the same, to watch the sunset,
to laugh about skimming stones and sea spray,
not knowing that such simple moments
would become elusive,
not repeated by us all again,
one or more of us missing in the future.
If we knew, would we try a little harder?
Be a little kinder?
Smile?
Listen more intently for a while?
Press pause on that 'last time,' just to hold it close,
let our senses register it all?
But the 'last time' doesn't ring a warning bell,
it slips quietly through our fingers
'til we stand still...
Wonder how it happened and what is to be next,
what each turning page of time has planned,
which will carry on and which will fade,
and what will become our next
'last time.'
Karen Honnor - 'Just Take Five - A Contemporary Poetry Collection.' 2022
Sadly, this year there will be several empty chairs at our family's tables, including a high chair that should have been occupied by an excited little one, taken far too soon. This is perhaps the hardest loss to begin to understand and I am sure that much of this Christmas will feel quite poignant and difficult. It is somehow easier to process the empty adult chairs as there is such a bank of joyful memories for us to look towards and to help us to reminisce.
I remember my Dad messing about at the dinner table, pretending that all sorts of items were hiding in his portion of Christmas pudding rather than just a simple coin wrapped in tin foil. When we were kids he would tell us that he had a hot line to Santa then disappear to call us from the upstairs phone - and we believed it all.
My Mother-in-law loved Christmas, cooked enough for an army to turn up for dinner, organised stocking presents for all - no matter their age and loved watching the grandchildren follow a treasure hunt around the house and garden to discover their sacks of presents. She transformed the house into a sparkling Christmas grotto with trees, garlands and a shelf of her collection of little snowy houses that grew each year.
To all those who will have empty chairs this year, may you find comfort in your memories and of how those loved ones enriched your lives.
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