A letter from Dec 20th, 2021

Dear FutureMe, Remember the Christmas of 2021? Oof is the only word I can use to describe it. Tears are the only thing I can show you to explain it. It's 5 days until Christmas and I'm supposed to be going to a party at my friends house. Yeah, that friend. Well I'm not. It really started on December 18th. It was Ruschman Christmas and the second my family and I walked in MaMa ushered us all into the family room. My cousin Dylan then proceeded to tell us that his autistic brother has Covid. His autistic and immune compromised brother.And his whole family, except for him, (because of a technicality) would be quarantined through Christmas. Rough start right? Well we hadn't even gotten to the arguments about vaccinations and mask mandates. We hadn't even gotten to the tears. Well now it's December 20th. A day I have been waiting for since the beginning of December. And how am I spending it? Well certainly not at a Christmas party with all my best friends. No. Sitting at home writing a letter to myself about how rough this Christmas season has been because my mom is worried about Covid and this pandemic has taken away some of the most simple joys of my life. Well this just sounds awful, right? One of my mom's closest friend's husband has been hearing voices and having conversations with people who aren't there. He says the voices are telling him to harm himself. He is on his way to a mental hospital as a write this. It hurts bad enough on its own, but to make matters worse, my aunt, my dad's sister, dealt with a serious mental health issue when I was very young. She was hospitalized, and my parents slipped that this "reminded them so much of Chris (my aunt)" I was never told the story, but this situation is dredging up painful memories for my parents and I just spent the last half hour researching what my mom's friend's husband might have, and what my aunt may have dealt with. I want to scream. For who, at what, I don't know. At lunch my mom saw a funeral procession passing by. "How sad," she said, "to have a funeral the week of Christmas." You know what else is sad Bridget? For your husband, your father, to hear voices telling him to harm himself the week of Christmas. To have your entire family quarantined the week of Christmas. To have a global pandemic take away the simple joys of Christmas. I remember the first Covid Christmas. Why is this one so much worse? Merry Christmas Mirabelle. Please have a better one this year.