Christmas Eve as a child: remember it (those of you who celebrate it that is)? At some point in the day, all else shuts down; you would gather around the tree, go to church or just generally hang out, but there was always a sense of anticipation, a sense of happiness unequaled on any other day. The two Christmas Eves before this one were set in some of the most difficult times of my life, last year’s particularly. Happiness is hard to find in those times, even on Christmas Eve. I remember then, looking to the past, remembering my childhood Christmases, remembering happy memories. But the troubles were so strong, not even that really worked, especially last year.

Those troubles of Christmas 2014 culminated in my trip to Texas about a month later, then-planned to be between two and four weeks, centered around getting my Rover and my puppy. That two to four week trip became its own problem and lasted roughly eight months. Because of the holding period that time was, I can’t really comprehend that Christmas 2014 was an entire year ago. Months went by in freezing snow and constant rain, in troubles surrounding those I love, troubles so severe I couldn’t talk about it; I couldn’t even actually experience anything except some neutral emotion that would allow me to survive, an emotion of survival that doesn’t allow for anything else. I wrote only the occasional story; I played, practiced and danced only the occasional moment. There was nothing in me but this neutrality, something that would not allow me to tap into that beauty of emotion that lets one write, or play music or dance least I lose the ability to keep fighting and surviving. But I survived, and I still survive — the emotional of neutrality still a necessity. From this, I have solved great issues in my life, things I never had the strength to face, not for years, things I was forced to face. And I’m not done.

I remember a moment, when I felt literally trapped, completely without money, my only bank account overdrawn even, when I said a prayer, one of those broken-person prayers where one is crying and on their knees (or if you’re George Bailey, bleeding and about to jump off a bridge), a prayer to God, a prayer to my dead mother, a pleading rant, while I was pretending to sleep in her bed, a prayer not, as most of mine are, of specific requests, but a prayer to give me the way, a way I knew not what it would be. I didn’t pray to get a job. I never wanted one. I wanted my business to survive. I still do. Still… things started to come, least of all a job — a job that allowed me to solve problems, to start to crawl out, for however long this lasts.

That wasn’t the only time I’ve had that rock-bottom prayer moment this year either. I sleep only in small bursts. I have many different things still in the air, many problems. About two other times, moments I didn’t think I had any way out, I did the same thing. Afterwards, I would find strength, I would be able to be two things for three people and keep going. I would pay bills. I would finish problems, so many problems over the past four months that I’ve decided all else will go on hold – emotions, writing, dance, everything, until the amount of problems are such I don’t go to bed feeling like I’m about to have heart attack. Fix me. Fix me first.

I estimate I’m about half-way-done, and half-way is a good thing. I don’t know how to shut off the emotional mode I’m in, and I don’t think I can yet, so happiness can wait, even Christmas Eve happiness. So I think. But… I did get myself things, presents, things most people wouldn’t question, but I don’t have and haven’t been able to buy for years while everyone around me seems to have so much. And it’s a pretty big list too: those Cowboy booties some hot girl had on that I’ve wanted for three years; a bargain 4K tv; guitar books (for when I decide I can let the emotional part of my brain take over again); a small, used Tiffany gold ring from eBay (I’ve wanted a Tiffany ring for years and this one will do), a new hammie to stand in the place of Goldie who died in Texas, poor baby. Still, there is this extra present, not as expensive or extravagant as those others that is different, a present less monetary. This present requires a story.

I was once a baton twirler, a good one, all from spending enormous (and I mean enormous) amounts of time practicing. Sure I do (did) skating; I do all these other things, but being a twirler… that was my core talent. People think of it as some sad thing that is done as a “talent” in beauty competitions; they think of it as silly. So when I went on in life from my days as a twirler at a 5A Texas high school, I never touched my batons; I never admitted to being a twirler, and if I did, I never admitted to the enormous amount of time that went into it. Over time, I lost track of all of it. In the years that passed, my sister took over my room, and I always believed my twirler existence — the batons, the photos, the awards, the sparkly costumes, were all thrown away.

When I was at my late mother’s house for those eight months, I went through her clothes and personal belongings, and in a zippered garment bag were my sparkling high school twirler costumes (along with a pretty tattered little dress from the time I was a baby). I couldn’t believe it. While I might have left it behind, my mother packed up at least some of it and stored it for herself. My nephew, with me when I found the costumes, acted like they were the most amazing things. He posted a photo of them on Facebook (or Instagram or whatever he uses) — “RHS twirler costumes” he wrote, proud of the color of “RHS”, my old high school, where he now attends. To him, being an RHS twirler wasn’t silly, so for me, … for a moment, it wasn’t either.

About a month ago, I was in an email conversation with my young friend talking about my nephew’s dance team. She’s the kind of person from whom I hid my past twirler activities, the kind of person who, I feel, thinks of such things as a waste of time, time that should be spent doing something (like school work) that benefits one for the entirety of their life. She didn’t say that, but I could tell. I agreed with her statement that I was having my Married with Children, Bundy moment (where he revels in being a former football player); still I said twirling was hard. I said there were things from it I learned that I actually carried throughout life, things that were valuable. I looked on Youtube to find videos to send her an example, to show her someone with my “style,” to show her that it was indeed hard. I sent her two videos, and that conversation ended. Yet after that, the spy that is Youtube kept putting twirler videos in with my daily suggestions. Let me tell you how funny it is to see Whole Lotta Love as a suggestion next to a video of a twirler in full sparkle. And I watched them; I watched them almost every day.

After watching for a handful of days, I started to feel the particular body motion of the move I was seeing. There is a feeling to it, a feeling that’s still in the farthest reaches of my emotional and creative mind, a feeling that is, for me, so beautiful. When I was young, I walked everywhere doing those moves. I was addicted to those feelings. Remembering that, I sooo wanted to pick up a baton just to feel it, the simple feeling of the weight in the easiest of the motions. But I don’t have a baton, and there wasn’t one left in my childhood house in Dallas or I would have brought it with the costumes. So I thought… I will get one! And it will be the same one I used to use: a Star, this baton with star-shaped rubber-thingy’s on the ends. I dilly-dallied on this. I mean, really? Am I going to use it? Where will I use it? I broke my nose with those silly things, my nose that I obsess over wanting to get fixed. But the delay ended. I ordered one: a Classic Star, 30 inch, 7/16 diameter baton.

The website asked the buyer to fill in one’s status, various definitions all the way from “twirler” (which I no longer am, so I decided I couldn’t check that) to “instructor/coach” to “other.” I checked “instructor/coach,” all the while thinking “other” might mean “I’m having my Bundy moment.” I thought: this will be my Christmas present. I thought I would twirl in the privacy of my own courtyard. And a strange thing happened. Out of this lack of emotion that allows me to press on but prevents me from being happy, I started to anticipate this present, anticipate, like … being almost happy.

I watched the FedEx tracking daily as the shipment made its way on a truck from Tennessee to Oklahoma to New Mexico to two cities in California that I’ve never heard of, then to “delivered.” That day, when I got home from my job, the long rectangular shipping box was perched on top of my front gate. I took the box down and brought it inside my house. I took in everything about this box, its words “Made in America,” the logo that looks exactly as it did in that decades-long-ago time when I first got my first Star baton, and then this special little touch: my name, first and last, handwritten on the outside of the box. Who cares about that writing, right? It’s probably just some preliminary packing notation. But I didn’t see it that way. Anyone could slap a shipping label on a box, a shipping label that has the recipient’s name on it. No. This was the handwriting of a person who chose that baton, the specific measurement for me, then wrote my name on the box to distinguish this baton from that of some other twirler’s. And it hit me. That person who packed that baton thought of me as a twirler, my name represented a twirler, not this woman working so hard, this woman trying to be two things at once, who spends every waking minute and the waking minutes of insomnia worrying about problems. No, at that moment, when that box was packed, my name was that of a twirler, that special thing I once was.

I opened the box. I took out the baton. It was wrapped in plastic. I twirled the plastic-wrapped baton with those same star ends I remember just long enough to get that feeling. The feeling was as I remember. But there was something bothering me about that moment. I felt like the plastic-wrapped Star baton should go back into the box to be opened, for real, to be taken out of the plastic and twirled outside in my courtyard for real, on Christmas Day. So there you have it. Christmas 2015, the Christmas of the year I was broken to my knees and had to begin again… is the year I do more than remember. I am going all the way back. I’m thinking if I have to begin again, I might as well … begin again. So? My Christmas present 2015: a Classic Star 30 inch 7/16 diameter baton, something literally from the very beginning, specially boxed with a hand notation to that girl who once was … a twirler.

And in this, the year of prayers, I can’t help but think all the things that brought this to me — from finding my high school costumes I thought were long gone, to seeing the pride in my nephew, to my discussions with my friend (for better or for worse) that lead me to the videos — are the answer to one of those fall-on-your knees prayers (just like the phrase that always gives me a tear from my favorite Christmas song, covered by my favorite girlie Ellie). So tonight, I say another one, a fall-on-your-knees prayer, a prayer for continued strength, especially in those many times when I don’t think I can keep fighting, and while I’m at it, a fall-on-your knees prayer for happiness, whatever that may be and from wherever it may come. I leave it up to the angels, who are doing a pretty good job so far.

Merry Christmas to all, and I hope each of you, in your own right … twirl!