Too Late for a Christmas Card
Every year for 20 years or so we received a Christmas card from our friend, Peggy C. By the time we received the last one we hadn’t seen one another in years, but Peggy was faithful and we always heard from her during the holidays. When I didn’t hear from her after a year or two I pulled out my address book and sent her a card. No response. In 2014 my card came back–no one at that address. I wanted to try again this year and googled her name and last address. In the results I saw Peggy’s executrix sold her apartment in 2014. That was it. Too late for a Christmas card.
I wasn’t as faithful as Peggy about sending Christmas cards. For many years Christmas was little but a mountain of stress: the year-end rush of work, shopping, dinner, managing emotional expectations, a constant blare of noise and rushing around and piped in holiday music. I got to hate Christmas and could hardly wait for it to be over. Christmas cards were at the bottom of the list. Too often I ran out of energy or enthusiasm to do them.
But I always liked to get them, and really appreciated the little notes sharing a happy memory or the latest news. I also appreciated Peggy’s constancy. I heard from her every year.
I started to think about Peggy as I made up my Christmas greeting list this month. I haven’t seen or spoken to her in almost 25 years, but she is so present for me every Christmas. I remember Peggy as a tall, very nice, refined and poised woman. She had dark blond year. One year she legally changed her name from her father’s to her mother’s–some unhappy story there. Peggy was quiet and had a very calm personality. She lived in the Murray Hill section of Manhattan for decades. When I asked a friend about her memories of Peggy, she said Peggy taught deaf students in the public school system. After she retired, she studied at the Interfaith Center on Riverside Drive. She was also a heavy smoker. Perhaps this had something to do with her death.
I met Peggy at a meeting of Catholic lesbians at the Lesbian & Gay Community Center on West 13th Street. The CCL-Center Group met monthly from 1985 to 1995. Peggy took over the mailing list from me when I had to choose between lesbian activist and hockey mom. Peggy was there at every meeting whether two or twenty women showed up.
What I learned from Peggy is the value of faithfulness. There was a card from her every year whether I reciprocated or not. She is my inspiration when I pick up my pen to write a note in each Christmas card, letting someone know I am thinking of them with love and affection, and they are remembered in this happy and holy time of year.
