A fractured fairytale Christmas.

Can we just fast forward to January. I’m not looking forward to this “first” Christmas.

Of course it’s not all about me. There’s family to think about. But there won’t be the annual family photo for the Christmas card. This is the one we took Thanksgiving 2022. The last one taken with Mike. I’m not doing one this year.

But we move forward as best we can. And if there’s anything that will help me keep going, it will be music. Not the Christmas carols, but the music that Mike and I shared and one very special, yet unfamiliar to most, Christmas song.

When it came to enjoying music, Mike and I truly had our different ways. I loved to sing; him, not so. I played the piano a lot. No musical instrument for him, but he did buy me a baby grand piano for my 70th birthday. When it came to the types of music, we sort of met in the middle. We had hundreds of cd’s and albums to support our likes.

I’d play, listen and sing to music. But it was Mike who really listened to songs. He’d often identify with lyrics. That was illustrated in how he was so attached to the Warren Zevon song, “Keep Me in your Heart for Awhile” that he wrote about in his green notebook and we had played at his funeral. Zevon, too, was battling cancer. He wrote that song after his diagnosis, and it was made part of the record “The Wind” which was released just two weeks after he died. I play the CD regularly, and the cozy blanket Mike gave me last Christmas is a beautiful reminder.

Leonard Cohen is another artist Mike and I enjoyed together. We have lots of his records, and on warm summer nights we’d set on the patio listening to some of his classics like “Closing Time” or “Ain’t No Cure For Love.” It was a version of Cohen’s iconic “Hallelujah” that was sung at Mike’s funeral.

But it was Irish music that held a special place for the two of us. We’d traveled to Ireland several times and always enjoyed listening to “craic” which is the music played by the locals in the pubs in Ireland. As for professional musicians and groups, The Chieftains became a favorite. We saw them in performance several times in the U.S. On one trip to Ireland we sought out the pub that was owned by the flutist from The Chieftains, Matt Malloy. To our good fortune, Matt happened to be there at that time. Of course we had to meet him, and Mike couldn’t have been happier when I snapped a picture of the two of them.

Daughter Jill introduced us to the ‘punk’ side of Irish music, and in particular, a band called The Pogues. Therein lies our special Christmas carol. The lead singer and group founder, Shane McGowan wrote “Fairytale of New York.” The setting is New York City on Christmas Eve. Two Irish immigrants are standing on the street corner, while the “boys in the NYPD choir are playing Galway Bay.” Part of the song is a duet by a man and woman:

Boy: I coulda been someone

Girl: Well, so could anyone. You took my dreams from me when I first found you.

Boy: I kept them with me girl. I put them with my own. Can’t make it all alone. I built my world around you.

Fairytale of New York

Parts of the song are laced with McGowan’s crusty language, but it’s still a beautiful song, meaningful to us. We’d play ‘Fairytale’ every Christmas as the family opened gifts, and when that part of the song played, we’d share a smile across the room. It was our song.

And it still is. I attended a session recently aimed at helping grievers deal with the holidays. It was helpful, to a point, but one thing struck me. The discussion centered on whether we should “move on” or “move forward.” Some said it’s best to start new traditions and move on from those you had with the person no longer here. Not so much for me. Certainly I’ll move forward through the holidays, but I’m playing that song and all the others from The Pogues as poignant reminders of the musical times Mike and I shared.

My fairytale seems a bit fractured right now as I prepare for the holidays and my “first” Christmas without him. I just heard this week that Shane McGowan, age 65, died. Leonard Cohen is gone, too, along with Warren. The Chieftains have just gotten too old to tour, and their founder Paddy Maloney has also died. I’ve cried a lot as I’ve listened to all the great songs by these musicians, but after a while I always end up smiling, because that’s what music does. It brings forth all sorts of emotions and because of that, it can be so healing. I’m so very glad I have those musical memories. They sustain me; there’s truly a song in my heart.

And Mike, whether you realized it or not, I, too, had a favorite Pogues song by Shane. It was “Darling, You’re the One.” You always will be.