Holidays on the Race

Happy Holidays!

I know it’s a little bit past the holidays, but I’m choosing to say my timely celebration just adds to the abstract experience of holidays on the race already.

This year’s Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Years all delivered very new and very untraditional celebrations for me.

I live in Iowa, so I’m used to a cold, often snowy, holiday season. Winter is what starts to make it feel like the holidays to me. So in November when my team and I joined our ministry host’s family for a classic Thanksgiving BBQ, It felt more like the Fourth of July.  We went to our host’s house and at a campfire, we worshiped, drank ponche, and ate chili reinos.  We did of course make time to go around the circle and say what we’re thankful for.  Other than the cold, notable parts of thanksgiving at home for me are the food and my family.  Expectedly so, we didn’t have turkey, Sister Schubert Rolls, mashed potatoes, or pumpkin pie and my family wasn’t there.  Thus starting our untraditional -to me- holiday season.

Christmas is a little bit more serious than thanksgiving, so beforehand, my team shared with each other more of what Christmas with our individual families looks like and traditions that make it feel like Christmas.  Grace, Jules, and I watched cheesy romantic Christmas movies because that’s what we do at home. The other thing on my list was peanut butter balls (aka buckeyes) and I got to make those with Lyssa for the Ohio State vs. Michigan game that she was very invested in.  We bought a tree and also decorated our room with stockings (actual socks), Christmas lights, and a wreath.  We spent quite a bit of time leading up to Christmas, making sure it was as celebrated for everyone as it could be.

On Christmas, we celebrated with the squad, which involved a fun combination of completely new experiences mixed in with some traditions I’ve seen before.  Our festivities technically started on Christmas Eve because that’s how it’s celebrated in Guatemala.  The night of Christmas Eve is focused on spending time with the people you love, leading up to the main spectacle of fireworks at midnight.  Then on Christmas Day we woke up at 6:30 am to have the reindeer run.  Everyone who was able to be shaken out of bed either walked or ran for 30 minutes and then we got ready for breakfast.  When we came into breakfast, the room was decked out with streamers, goodie bags, and candy, and there were warm cinnamon rolls ready for everyone to eat.  It was a good way to start the day.  After we ate, we exchanged gifts for our squad Secret Santa.  43 is a large number of people to do a gift exchange with, so we took a while with that, but it was really fun.  My team also did a Secret Santa, so we exchanged those gifts afterward too.  After that, we had most of the day free to call our families or do our own mini Christmas celebrations, until 2 when we had a ginger bread house competition, decorated with whatever ingredients we had in the cupboard.  After that, I started cooking my contribution to Christmas dinner.  I spent the rest of my afternoon making veggie lasagna, FaceTiming my mom, and getting dressed up for a lovely night.

At dinner, we had folding tables set up across the yard in one long line and Guatemala’s nickname, ‘The Land Of Eternal Springs’, proved true once again with the beautiful weather. The warmth was still throwing me off, but dinner did make it feel somewhat more like Christmas.  Each team on the squad was in charge of bringing something for the squad to eat, so I got to enjoy a number of foods that are commonly seen in a Christmas dinner and others that weren’t as traditional to me.  We had veggie lasagna, mashed potatoes, Mac and cheese, rolls, deviled eggs, black bean salsa, guacamole, sweet potato casserole, and pie.  It was so delicious and I had a really great time with my squad, despite the sadness of being away from my biological family.

During all of our celebrating, I would regularly state that it didn’t feel like Christmas.  I missed the feeling that I usually got during the holiday season.  Stepping outside in negative degree weather was Christmas to me.  Smelling pine was Christmas.  Driving to church at night was Christmas.  Opening presents by a strange numbered system with my family was Christmas.  However, after going through an amazing Christmas celebration, I found the joy in it being different.  It didn’t feel like Christmases that I had experienced before because it was all new, but that’s also what made it so great.  It was hard because it didn’t meet some of the expectations I held, but it far exceeded my expectations in aspects I never would have anticipated.  Now I’m sure it’s a Christmas I’ll never forget.

When New Years rolled around, I had far fewer expectations, and thankfully I did, because that holiday was so different.  On New Years Eve, we started our celebration with dinner, worship, and then The Squad Olympics.  We played a bunch of different games and it was one of the most chaotic rooms I’ve ever been in, which is saying something. It was amazing.  One of my favorite games involved a bowl of numbers and a list of activities corresponding to each number. We were given a time limit and our 5 teams were racing against each other to complete as many tasks that you draw as possible. Some of my favorite tasks were the ones that involved other teams. When a task said to give 10 high fives or play duck duck goose with another team, they were required to stop what they were doing and help you, so sabotage was a large factor.

The rest of the night involved The Cotton Eyed Joe, candy, fireworks, a mini disco ball tied to a string, a year-end video (credits to Arianna), and more worship.

Each holiday brought something new with it, and I wouldn’t have it any other way.