Christmas Eve Is a Gift

Why my grandmother loved the hope and promise of the day before

- By Elizabeth Passarella

The first time I cried on Christmas morning was a couple of years after I got married. My newish husband and I were spending the holiday with his parents in Connecticut, and though I was a 30-year-old woman, I was not yet a mother, which meant I was still in that pre-parenthood phase of life and believed that Christmas morning was for me. My generous mother-in-law must have, on some level, understood this, which is why she bought me an expensive vacuum cleaner that year. I still have it, and I'd grab it in a fire before any family photo albums but her primary audience was her grandchildren, my husband's sisters' kids. They did not arrive at my in-laws' house until the afternoon of December 25, after opening presents in their own living rooms in New York City. So Christmas did not really start until around 3 or 4 p.m., depending on traffic. That morning in 2007, I left my sleeping husband in bed and walked downstairs to the living room. Instead of finding a percolating coffeepot and preheated ovens, I found my mother-in-law in the dark, standing next to a half-decorated tree. (She often put on the final ornaments and lights as everyone pulled into the driveway.) She mentioned that she was going to Starbucks and asked if I would like anything. A latte, maybe, or a bagel?

I walked back upstairs, shut myself in the bathroom, and sobbed. When my husband knocked on the door and asked what was happening, I shouted something about the Earth surely being off its axis and "Do you think Starbucks serves Bloody Marys?"

Now, 17 years into marriage, I know things. Starbucks does not offer Bloody Marys, for one. My mother-in-law values togetherness and gifts over decorations and homemade cinnamon rolls.