December 23 is my favorite day of the Advent season. The expectation for Christmas is thick in the air and the anticipation is heavy on my heart. Something magical will happen tomorrow. We just have one more day to wait.
Growing up December 24 was the day Baba and Dido would drag us around to friends and family, singing Christmas carols and handing out tins of cookies. The trunk of their Chrysler was always full of Christmas tins and the tins were full of at least eight different kinds of cookies. We'd dress up in our Christmas finery, load up and spend the day driving from house to house. Though it sounds like torture, it was actually a lot of fun.
Somewhere towards the end of the day we'd end up at Grandpa and Grandma Lubovich's house. They weren't my grandparents, but we called them Grandpa and Grandma. They were the cutest little Ukrainian couple ever and kind of reminded me of gnomes. Grandma's voice was high and sweet and her accent made it hard to understand her. She'd hold my chubby face in her hands and kiss me, saying sweet things and telling me she loved me. Grandpa had a warm, deeper voice and his English was better. And he'd hug and kiss us too. Their home smelled of moth balls and pickles. Not an appealing description, but I smile when I think of it. We'd sing songs and exchange gifts and then we'd eat. Pickled everything: onions, mushrooms, and even pickled fish. I never ate the fish.
I'm not sure when our Christmas Eve visiting stopped. I think I was in junior high. I don't know if it's because most of the people we visited were gone by then or maybe we just didn't all fit into that old Chrysler any more. But then Christmas Eve was the day my sister and I would walk around our neighborhood and give Christmas treats to all the neighbors. Sometimes, they'd give us treats back. The best treats were the homemade spring rolls from Mrs. Quintong.
Later, after Baba died, we celebrated Christmas eve in true Ukrainian style for a few years. I was in college and spent a lot of time researching the traditional celebration and trying to recreate it. I'd make three loaves of braided bread, coiled into a wreath, stacked one on top of another. And there were to be twelve dishes, most of them pickled items. The food was nothing special but I think it gave me sad heart comfort.
Eventually I met Scott and Christmas eve morphed again. Blending his family traditions with mine was hard. Christmas Eve lunch on the boat with his dad and step-mom. Then dinner at a Mexican restaurant with his mom followed by aebilskivers with his grandparents. I loved Scott's Grammie and PopPop. And after we got married, they changed again. Christmas Eve supper was now at our house and then family friends would come and while the night away.
Our celebrations still start on Christmas Eve. Tomorrow, we will have a "fancy" breakfast on the good china. We will make aebilskivers and drink apple cider like we did with Grammie and PopPop. Then we'll open presents. Later in the evening, my family will come for a luau.
The anticipation and expectation of all the goodness and fun that will come tomorrow is stored up in happy memories and missing loved ones. And that bittersweet feeling makes me think back to the first Christmas Eve when Mary was anticipating a baby and Israel was expecting a Messiah. And something magical happened. The King of the Universe was both the baby Mary anticipated and the Messiah Israel expected born in a barn, laid in a trough, heralded by angels, worshiped by shepherds and rich men. A baby born to make all sad things come untrue. And that makes me anticipate the day He will return for us. What a glorious day that will be! And I will get to celebrate my King once again with all my grandparents!
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