The Year I Became the Grinch: When Traditions Feel Like Heartbreak

 When Traditions Feel Like Heartbreak

​I used to wonder why the Grinch hated Christmas. To me, this season was always the pinnacle of joy. I grew up with the magic of caroling, the rhythmic wishes of "Plugusorul," and that restless, beautiful anticipation of giving and receiving gifts. Christmas wasn't just a date; it was a feeling of a home bursting at the seams with life.

​Back home in Romania, Christmas meant a feast that took days to prepare. We had "Sarmale" (traditional cabbage rolls stuffed with a savory mix of minced meat and rice, slow-cooked to perfection) and "Turte" (thin, handmade layers of dough, soaked in sweet walnut syrup, symbolizing the swaddling clothes of the Child). The air was thick with the scent of fresh cakes and the traditional pig slaughter rituals that bring the whole community together. It was a time of abundance, warmth, and family.

​But this year, I finally understand why someone would want to skip Christmas.

​This year, the silence in my family home is deafening. My mother is no longer here with me. While my siblings have their own lives, I found myself navigating a sea of paperwork and a total change in my world. I tried to escape the loneliness—I had a ticket to the UK to be with my sister, but the bureaucracy of the ETA and timing failed me. I had a second ticket to Berlin to visit a friend, but life took him to Sweden to care for his own sick mother. One by one, the doors closed.

​I am standing in the middle of the house where we used to decorate the tree together—me, my mother, and the grandkids. I have the tree, I have the decorations, I have everything I need... except the heart to do it. Decorating a tree alone in a house that used to be full of laughter feels like a chore of shadows. So, I chose not to. No lights, no ornaments, no festive spirit.

​If I had made it to England or Germany, I would have been a guest, surrounded by a different energy. But here, in the family nest, the absence of my loved ones is too heavy to carry. My plan for today is simple: put on my headphones, turn the music up until I can't hear my own thoughts, and sleep until the calendar turns.

​To you, the reader, I want to say this: if you have your family around you today, if your parents are still there to share a meal with you, please treasure every second. Make them feel like the world. You don't realize how precious the "noise" of a family is until it's replaced by a silence so loud it hurts.

​I may not be having a Merry Christmas, and the joy didn't find its way to my door this year, but I truly hope it finds yours. Hold your loved ones tight.

Merry Christmas everyone!