Advent 19
Thursday, Third Week of Advent
15 December 2022
My friends like to tell me that my life is a movie.
“Eva, you’ve had so many cinematic experiences. You might as well just write them all down.” Well, I suppose that’s why I do. I became a poet and songwriter to chronicle the film-like moments that happen to me. But lately, things have gone a little off track.
It’s the holiday season, as everyone knows, which means there should be reasonable expectations for the screenplay of these next few weeks. How about a scene where I can curl up on a couch with my hot cocoa and my tabby cat? Or how about some good family time with my uncle, who has a habit of giving very epic advice? Or even, a snowstorm that swirls in little pirouettes out of the sky, right on top of my shoulders, as the person I’ve been in love with for a year finally confesses their love for me?
This would all be great, and as my mother likes to say, there’s nothing wrong with a little Hallmark Christmas movie every now and then. So how come my life is feeling so far from it?
If you’d seen these past few weeks in a script, you’d likely toss it out. It’s better for a drama, or an obscure holiday tragedy that you find at the end of your Amazon prime suggestions. My uncle passed away over Thanksgiving, and ever since then, things haven't been great. I still feel like I’m living in a movie, but one where the main character can’t figure out what she’s supposed to say. Should she move back to her small town and start up a Christmas tree farm? Should she tell the person she loves the way she feels, and hope that they run back to her like at the end of When Harry Met Sally? Well, not to ruin the movie or anything, but that hasn’t worked out too well for me either.
So what can we do? When Hallmark seems to be the ideal, but life has a habit of challenging our expectations.
Well, I still believe in love. Even the dumb rom com romance kind. I still believe that family is strong enough to stick together, even when you lose someone. And I still believe that life has so much to give, even if it doesn’t give you exactly what you thought.
So spoiler alert: everything is going to be okay. This holiday season may not look like a Hallmark movie for anyone, especially college students going through finals, but it will be special. There will be moments where you laugh for ten minutes walking down the sidewalk with friends, where you win the basketball game, where you finally get the right word for an essay. And then, there will be moments where you want to throw your computer at the wall, and blame somebody for how life works, and quit during your last rep in the gym. There will be all of this, because that’s what life is. Unlike Hallmark, it has both the good and bad. That’s why it’s so complicated.
That’s why it’s so wonderful.
Have an amazing advent season, everybody. I hope that when you look back on this Christmas, even if it’s not what you wanted, you can say that you gave it your all.
That it was real.
Cheers,
Eva Millay Evans ’25
