share.triangle.com - Homesick for the holidays? - Comments

oh ,man The holiday season

Visitor — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 04:09:00 -0400

oh ,man
The holiday season can be wonderful, but it can be tough, too

but you need to relax,I'm homesick all year long, not just at the Holidays. Holidays are the only time I get any relief.

With summer rapidly approaching, it's time to start thinking about sun, fun, swimming pools, beaches and water sports.
the first item on your checklist should be swimming goggles, summer is coming and the bikini-girl is waiting for me, so........

BTW.I need a swimming goggle, is anyone knows this website?

http://www.sourcingmap.com/swimming-goggles-c-1350_1353.html

IMO , it is very cheap

Homesick Midwesterner

Visitor — Thu, 27 Dec 2007 12:40:57 -0500

Living in the Triangle, you never hear too much about people from the midwest, especially Chicago. I miss a lot about Chicago but especially the snow and food. The food is terrific. There is nothing like a good kosher hotdog with all the Chicago trimmings including mustard, relish, onions, tomatoes, cucumbers, sport peppers and celery salt! And since I have moved here in 1993, I do not eat pork anymore. The baby back ribs of Carson's Ribs are tremendous. And yes it is sweet barbeque sauce not that bitter vinegar based they serve here. And of cours Jay's Potatoe Chips! There is nothing like them!

Yes I miss my dear city and unfortunately, cannot really talk much about it because most of the people I work with are transplants from the Northeast and they just do not understand!

What I miss most about the holidays

shellyval — Sun, 23 Dec 2007 15:41:29 -0500

...in South Florida are the gaudy Christmas decorations; particularly, the Santas being pulled by neon pink flamingos - in lieu of reindeer - on the rooftops of chimney-less ranch houses! As much as I enjoy the tasteful white lights and red-ribboned wreaths in Raleigh this time of year, nothing compares to multi-colored lights at the top of coconut palm trees, swaying in the tropical breezes!!!

-Jennifer Irving Kochman
Raleigh

IWhat I miss most this

shellyval — Sun, 23 Dec 2007 15:40:55 -0500

IWhat I miss most this holiday season is my oldest son, Zachary, who will be 22 on January 2nd. He lives in another state, very far away, as he has been attending college out there. It seems as if he is on another planet.

We were always very close because his father left us in 1992, when Zack was only 6, and he always felt he had to help me take care of his younger brother and sister.

Perhaps that also factored into why he struck out, completely on his own with little plan, at 18. He said he did not want to be a burden to me and he had to carry his own and off he went. He worked 2 jobs and got student loans and carried the weight for almost 3 yrs but then he finally gave up and dropped out of college, much to my dismay. He could do ANYthing he wanted to. He was always an honor roll student and good grades came so easily; he is so very book smart. He can converse with most anyone about most anything; he knows that much. He has the kindest heart, always wanting to help others out.

But I have not seen him in a year and he told me 3 wks ago he is not coming home to be with his sister and brother and I for Christmas and I cannot imagine anything more sad.

It is not Christmas.

Christmas for me is all about me having some time off from my job; I take my vacation this time every year, from the 20th til Jan 4th. The kids birthdays are Dec 30th, Jan 2nd and Jan 12th.!! I take the time off and I get to spend time with my children, cooking for them, seeing them smile, and laugh, and more. That is what Christmas is to me, my children.

For many years we were all one another had. Their grandparents have been gone long before they were born, so we have always been just the 4 of us, no family, few friends til they got much older.. for so very long. With Zachary gone now, I often feel like a ship adrift at sea.

I am struggling so hard to try to be up for this Christmas for the other 2 children, but I miss Zachary and the talks we could always have, more than anyone can understand.

Joanna Collier

Home

Daphany K. Branch — Sat, 22 Dec 2007 12:15:42 -0500

I grew up in Pittsburgh,PA and have lived in the triangle
for 18 years. I miss the snow and downtown Pittsburgh. The Christmas displays of Kaufmann's, Hornes and Gimbel's Department store are long gone but not forgotten. I miss the beautiful bridges and meeting friends under the "Kaufmann Clock." Most of all I miss my grandfather who worked in steel mills and made our Christmas so special. He left home around 5:00am and returned in the evening. I still can remember
my grandfather bringing home the tree on Christmas Eve. His coat would smell of pine and be covered with snow. He passed away in 2003 and the holidays will never be the same. I am thankful to still have a mother who is now visiting for the holidays and I also have more family in Pittsburgh. The triangle may be my place of residence but Pittsburgh will always be my home.

a teaching for life

Deirdre Perry — Tue, 11 Dec 2007 09:49:27 -0500

It was the year of 1969 i was 19years old and lived just outside of Belfast north Ireland it was Christmas eve and we had a very slow day in sales because of the weather outside so after i closed my register i then bundled up to face what lay ahead out side so i pulled up my coat collar and faced the worst storm in quite a few years the snow was coming down so fast and the north winds were blowing so fiercely that you couldn't see a yard in front of you i thought to my self what am i going to do when out of the shadow stood this tall giant a man clad in a heavy old army overcoat with a balaclava on his head a ski mask here in this country well low and behold who was it but my DA i could have cried for joy especially in this weather i grabbed his arm to feel the familiar comfort oh DA i am so glad to see you how are we ever going to get home which was 7 miles outside of the city we never owned a car my da says awh love the buses are not running so we better walk i guess but first there is somethere i need you to go with me i looked at him like he was crazy but to me my da was a gaint a part of old ireland because he lived and died for his country but daddy were are we going there was not a sinner on the streets dont worry love we will be ok so we started trudging up high street and then castle street it did feel special and scary at the same time the north winds were blowing like gale force so it was hard to keep your balance when finaly we reached the falls road and stood in front of saint peters church i looked up and it was very hard to see that inspiring steeple that overlooked the city so all in one breath afraid i wouldnt get another one i yelled da what are we doing here midnight mass isnt for a few hours and ma will kill us if we dont get homeaw love it will be alright says my da so he pulled open those big heavy wooden doors and when we stepped in it was like standing in a freezer da its so cold in here this wont take long love so we go up to the alter and there in front is four we coffins childrens coffins i looked at my da and he told me that there had been a house fire earlier that week and the four children did not make it through the tears i saw on each of there coffins a drum a truck adoll and a horn my da turned to me looked me seriously and said you see Deirdre no matter what you have in life there are two things that should mean more to you than anything and that is having your family and faith faith in God looking back at that night brings tears to my eyes my father wanted to teach me something and he did America is my home but Ireland will always be in my heart

I confess I don’t really

shellyval — Thu, 29 Nov 2007 22:06:57 -0500

I confess I don’t really know what it means to be homesick, in the conventional sense of the word. I am that rarest of Triangle creatures: a native. I am a local girl, grew up in Garner, attended magnet schools in Raleigh, and never ventured farther afield than UNC-Chapel Hill in any permanent way. So as an adult, I am still surrounded by the familiar places and traditions of my childhood memory….with one important exception.

In August of 2002, I lost my mother, Linda. She died of pneumonia just days after our family discovered that the endometrial cancer she was treated for in 1999 had metastasized and spread throughout every organ system in her body. The shock of her death served to anesthetize me for that first unthinkable holiday season without her. It wasn’t until the next year that I was able to notice my feelings of loss and bewilderment as the holiday season approached. If my mother was my country, then I have become a displaced person. I feel this most acutely during Christmas.

My mama LOVED Christmas. Whole closets, utility rooms, and the bulk of her attic were filled with Christmas decorations. J

ust after Halloween each year, she would start planning her gift-giving list and the logistics of each holiday meal. Santa Claus never stopped coming to my house on Bayberry Lane in Garner, not when I was 16, 19, or 21. Not even when I got married and had to drive 40 miles to get to my childhood living room on Christmas morning.

Mama also loved to dream up ideas for gifts for her coworkers at Dorothea Dix Hospital in Raleigh. She would orchestrate the staff Thanksgiving and Christmas
celebrations, decorating the table in the all-purpose meeting room with colored leaves or miniature Christmas trees. She bought gifts for needy families
sponsored by her department at Christmas. She picked names off the “Angel Tree” at the mall and spent evenings rolling a cart through K-Mart, looking for
the perfect toy.

I inherited a little of my mother’s gift-giving acumen, and I also love the feeling of giving to those in need. But I find I can never re-create a holiday that feels like the ones Mama planned. I don’t have her innate sense of how much food to make so that there’s plenty to eat, but not a fridge full of
leftovers.

I can’t bring a roomful of strangers together for a holiday party so that by the end, they all feel like family. It was something in her way: the way on Christmas Eve, she would play Christmas music and pull out her best crystal pickle dishes, her
cake saver and her ancient hand mixer. She made the best turkey, the best oyster dressing, the best ham, the best fried chicken, the best red velvet cake.

She would only buy collards that had come from Johnston County or east (because they taste better when they’re grown in the sandier coastal soil), and only after the frost had “touched” them. I can still hear the clatter of her Revere Ware pot lid as she simmered chunks of rutabaga, something only she and I would eat. She was so happy and excited to make the meal, to invite our aunts and uncles and cousins to share it with us. I never saw her nervous or flustered about whether the food would be good or everyone would get along: it just was, and we just did. I find myself endlessly agonizing over menus and activities, becoming unhinged by the pressure and my own expectations, until more often than not I give up and
suggest we go to a restaurant instead.

After one attempt to hold a Christmas gathering for our entire family in mama’s old house, I saw that I would never be able to do what she did, and that I would never feel the same no matter how lavish and thoughtful a party I plan.

It was because she did it for me, and my brother, and all of our extended family. I’ll never feel so well-cared for, so content, so safe, ever again.

I can accept this, and I can work to forge a new set of traditions and make new holiday memories. Because I also inherited my mother’s love of Christmas, I can still love the holiday season even though it reminds me of what I can never get back.

My husband and I and our

shellyval — Thu, 29 Nov 2007 21:56:05 -0500

My husband and I and our Tibetan Terrier moved to Durham in March from
California.

We are both native Californians and my family is still there. I was born and raised in Garden Grove, which was at that time a town of 45,000 residents in Orange County. My mother's brother and his family lived about two blocks away and my maternal grandparents were about 1/2 mile down the road.

We have always been a close family and so the holidays were always spent together. I am 60 years old and have always been with my family during the holidays even though we resided in San Diego about 125 miles south of Garden Grove. Thanksgiving and Christmas were always at my grandparents house with
my sister and three cousins and I eating in the kitchen while the
adults ate in the formal dining room.

As kids we had a great time by ourselves during the dinners....and it was our duty to wash and dry the dinner dishes before games could be played or presents opened.

At Christmas we always had dinner Christmas eve at my grandmothers
house where "Gra" would make oyster stew for the adults and bean
soup for the kids with a jello and fruit salad and homemade cinnamon
rolls. Dinner was followed with opening the presents exchanged
between the three families.

One by one we would open a gift and move onto the next person. Laughter, Christmas carols and lots of hugs and kisses occurred at the same time. Christmas morning would find my cousins in their home opening gifts and we would be in our home doing the same.

Brunch would follow at our house with the three families followed later in the day with Christmas dinner at my aunts and uncle home. My grandparents and my father have passed. My uncle and aunt are in assisted living and my mother at 84 years old is going strong in her home in Garden Grove.

This will be the first holiday season that I will not spend with my West Coast family....the trade off will be spending the holidays with our two sons who reside in this area with our four grandchildren. New memories will be made along with the warm loving memories of the past.

Jamie Mecham

What I miss is…everything!

shellyval — Thu, 29 Nov 2007 21:47:51 -0500

What I miss is…everything! I’m from Washington, D.C., where I’d lived all my life until moving here in 2005.

There are just some things about Washington that are magical, like the lighting of the national Christmas tree (which brings back teenage memories of singing at the Pageant of Peace, the nightly celebration that goes with it) the Nutcracker Suite performed at Constitution Hall, or the annual performance of Handel’s Messiah by my church, complete with orchestra.

But more importantly, I miss the times with my family. I miss my Aunt Martha, who came down from New York City nearly every Christmas to celebrate with us, and even taught me how to make fruit cake and homemade wine. Even though I’ve been here since 2005, I’ve always had my parents with me on Christmas day, and due to health problems, this year will be the first in my 45 years without them on Christmas day. I’ll carry on the tradition of making the eggnog, and making homemade ornaments my father – an industrial arts teacher – so lovingly made for me to decorate.

So it’s a little different, a little harder, watching parents age and things change, but there is joy with my husband watch our 5-year-old daughter embrace the wonder of the holidays. And prayerfully, we’ll get to see the parents on December 26th. I guess I’m growing up.

Kim Q. B. Leathers

I moved to NC from Puerto

shellyval — Thu, 29 Nov 2007 21:41:49 -0500

I moved to NC from Puerto Rico 4 months ago so I am sure I will miss a lot of things.

I'll miss my family, my friends, the warm weather, the long Christmas season (in PR we celebrate until the Three Kings Day in January 6), the happy music but the thing I am really going to miss is a Catholic tradition of "Misas de aguinaldo".

For the 9 days before Christmas (reperesenting the 9 months of pregnancy of the Virgin Mary), we go to mass at 5:30 AM and celebrate with music. There are lots of children and everybody brings their musical instruments and sing the traditional Christmas Mass songs.

At the end, we share a big breakfast hosted every day by a different community. At 7-7:30 a.m. everybody is free to go to school or work, full of food, happiness, but most of all, full of the spirit of Baby Jesus.

Aida Lugo

Today begins a journey

shellyval — Thu, 29 Nov 2007 21:37:26 -0500

Today begins a journey towards Christmas that I am not sure I can walk. Last year, two weeks before Christmas, my sister passed away after a hard and valiant fight against cancer.

People don't understand that when you lose a loved one during the holidays, it changes that holiday forever. There is no looking at Christmas without the memory of a loved one passed.

Sure, outward there are no signs of a broken heart that beats for just one more chance to say goodbye, I love you. But we carry on for those left behind. We say Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays but all the while our heart does not feel what our mouth says.

But, life goes on. I will miss her the most this Christmas as I have missed her all year long. I comfort myself in the realization that she is with me always... I carry her in my heart.

Cindy Smith

My husband and I are from

shellyval — Thu, 29 Nov 2007 20:54:41 -0500

My husband and I are from the Netherlands, our two sons (ages 3 years, and 5 months) were born here in North Carolina (Cary).

When I saw your request to you tell about what people miss during the holidays, I had to write about “Sinterklaas”.

If you’d translate Sinterklaas into English, it would be Santa Claus. Except, he’s not Santa Claus. Dutch children (and grown-ups) celebrate the feast of Sinterklaas traditionally on December 5th and the days before that.

Sinterklaas was the Bishop of Myra, he has a long white beard, wears a red bishop's dress and red mitre. He carries a big book with all the children's names in it, which states whether they have been good or naughty in the past year.

About 2 weeks before December 5th, Sinterklaas arrives by steamboat in the Netherlands (and Belgium too), coming from Spain. This is actually broadcast on national television as a major event. From that day on, children can place their shoe near the chimney (or other suitable place, because many homes in the Netherlands don’t have chimneys anymore) and if they’ve been good, the next morning they will receive small presents and candy (it’s up to the parents to determine how often children are allowed to place their shoe in front of the chimney).

Sinterklaas is assisted by ‘Zwarte Pieten’ (Black Petes). Pete's face is said to be "black from soot" (as Pete has to climb down chimneys to deliver his gifts). Sinterklaas rides a white horse across the rooftops.

On December 5th, it’s ‘pakjesavond’ (presents evening). Families will gather and wait for their presents. Sometimes they’re hidden in the house, but most often Zwarte Piet or Sinterklaas himself will bang on the front door and leave a big bag with presents.

Along with the presents, there are poems written by Sinterklaas or Zwarte Piet. Everybody eats special candy and chocolate, and the children will sing Sinterklaas songs.

You can find this and much more information at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinterklaas

In the Netherlands, Christmas is slowly taking over Sinterklaas, but I will still raise my children to believe that Sinterklaas exists, because I have always loved the tradition of Sinterklaas, as a child but also as a grown-up.

We even used to gather with other adults and gave each other presents and poems (using a system where you don’t know who gave you the present), where the presents were often wrapped in a special way (called ‘surprise’). You’d have to break apart the surprise to find the gift hidden inside.

Now that we live in the United States, I miss this family event a lot. Fortunately we’re still somewhat able to celebrate Sinterklaas. Family or friends will sometimes send us the typical Sinterklaas candy (only available in November and December) or I’ll order it online. I will let my 3-year-old sing songs and let him place his shoe near the chimney. He also watches the “Sinterklaas News” on Dutch national television, using the internet. But still I’m not sure if he really ‘gets it’.

Many of the Dutch people living in the Triangle are members of the Dutch club ‘De Wieken’, which will organize a special Sinterklaas afternoon on December 1st (because Sinterklaas has to be back in the Netherlands on December 5th, of course). It will be the second time for our oldest son to meet Sinterklaas, and it will probably be a little bit of a scary event for him, because it’s impressive to meet Sinterklaas. But receiving gifts will make up for a lot!

Jessica Bot

Community spirit

shellyval — Thu, 29 Nov 2007 20:50:34 -0500

Not the lack of snow, quality of Christmas trees or unavailability of favorite foods that would make my homesickness difficult.

It is the lack of community that I feel in this area.

School officials continue to break up and destroy any chance for social development that transplants so desperately seek the first few years they relocate.

The children in my community attend over 10 different schools! Most private along with Magnet, Charter and regularly assigned public schools. What a disgrace that this county gets away with shipping children all over the place in a desperate attempt to manipulate test scores.

Lynn Sprufera

Missing friends and students

shellyval — Thu, 29 Nov 2007 20:48:25 -0500

I will miss working with my former Latino students at Fremont Ross High School in Ohio, especially receiving their homemade greeting cards.My friend's Spanish class singing Christmas carols in Spanish.

Our country home where we played outdoors with our boys and made the snowman with spiked up hair made out of snow who also sported some cool orange swim goggles.

The infamous cookie exchange with my friends. These are just some of the things that make me homesick, but being new to the Triangle is a reason to make new holiday memories just the same.

Lucy Brummett
Creedmoor

Missing Dad

shellyval — Thu, 29 Nov 2007 20:45:53 -0500

I had to smile when I read the query regarding stories for the Homesick Holidays.

Growing on up eastern, Long Island, missing snow, having lived in Los Angeles for 15 years and having a wife who grew up in Portland, Oregon, I guess we meet pretty much every category you listed.

I guess in my case however, my sense of homesickness comes from the fact that my Dad passed right after Christmas of last year. He lived in Southampton, Long Island and, for some reason, his goal was to live to be one day older than his Mom.

Just before Christmas he suffered a mild heart attack and had to go in for quadruple bypass surgery. He made it through that okay but was then moved to a rehab facility and died a month or so later. We discovered that not only did he die as the result of poor care at the facility but that as many as 10 other people died the same way, in a 6 week period.

Oddly, his house was for sale at the time, and it closed two hours before he passed away. We knew as Dad grew older that we would not have him for too many more Christmases but we didn't expect to lose him that way. Losing Dad and our home at the same time was very difficult and it also meant no more of those walks in the snow I so missed growing up, no more Dad and Mom taking me to Santa the way he did when I was a child and no more hearing him tell the same old tired stories we'd have to hear every time we visited.

Needless to say, I now miss those stories very much and I can still remember the beautiful, Rockwellesque village of Southampton the way it looked blanketed with snow. I was adopted at birth and I could not have hoped for better adoptive parents, but the hole at Christmas left by my Dad can never be filled, save for my hope that he's now with my Mom again, free of pain and the loneliness that can come with growing old.

Ken Vrana

Homesick for the holidays?

mike williams — Fri, 23 Nov 2007 11:47:59 -0500

One down, two to go.

We got through Thanksgiving. Next up: Christmas or Hanukkah and New Year’s Eve.

The holiday season can be wonderful, but it can be tough, too. Especially if you’re one of more than 25,000 transplants new to the Triangle each year.

Do you miss the comforts and the traditions of your the hometown you left behind? Take a moment to share the things you miss most from home.

Not homesick but have holiday stories to share? Click here to share your favorite holiday memories or click here to post your homemade holiday cards.

One down, two to go. We got through Thanksgiving. Next up: Christmas or Hanukkah and New Year’s Eve. The holiday season can be wonderful, but it can…