Homemade Christmas Ornaments, East Ukrainian Village, Chicago
In 1995 I was 20 years old. I was in my 6th year of a 7-year-long relationship and we lived together in Kaukauna, Wisconsin. I was 20 going on 40, or at least it felt like it, and I made a lot of homemade Christmas ornaments. Plastic canvas, cross stitch, painted ceramic and wood. I remember being so proud that there wasn’t a store-bought ornament on our entire Christmas tree.
Fast forward through a whole bunch of stuff to the summer of 2001. I was in San Diego preparing to move to New York City. I knew my apartment was going to be small so I packaged the things that meant something to me and shipped them to my parents’ house. All of the rest, I sold. When I moved to Chicago earlier this year my parents brought down some of the things that they’d been storing for me. I was eager to use my closets (closets, can you imagine!?) and I didn’t really have time to go through it all so I stored it away. Last night I went through some of the boxes and found all of my homemade Christmas ornaments.
Yesterday I was talking to Margaret about deer hunting and the shooting that happened over the weekend in Wisconsin. The suspect is Hmong. Margaret grew up in NY state, not a great distance from New York City, and didn’t know what a deer stand was. She also didn’t know anything about the Hmong community and the prejudices they many times face and are going to face in the wake of this weekend’s shooting. And I knew far too much. When I talk about these things, when I hold a Christmas ornament in my hand that I spent hours making almost 10 years ago, it feels foreign. But so familiar. Like it was another life, and yet it could have been yesterday.
I look around me right now and wonder which things that I hold dear, which things I make with my own two hands, will seem foreign to me when I look back at them 10 years from now. My digital camera? This website? Who knows. But one thing is for certain: I am getting fucking old. And sappy.
11 responses so far ↓
1 Paul // Nov 23, 2004 at 8:16 am
Rachelle you’re not f…ing old. I’m 50 and feel like saying the same about myself, then I consider my 82 year old father or 90 year old mother-in-law. 29 doesn’t seem so bad when you think in those terms.
2 tien // Nov 23, 2004 at 8:17 am
20 and in a 6th year of a relationship!??!?
3 Edwin // Nov 23, 2004 at 12:05 pm
Hey Rachelle! I know exactly what you mean about feeling like it was another life. I grew up in the Philippines and moved here when I was 14 and thinking back or watching old movies, it feels like ages and ages ago and I almost don’t recognize it all. It’s weird cause in a way I wonder had I not moved would I be here typing this, checking out your site, or worse—would I have bought that Clay Aiken CD?*lol* I guess being that I’m 29 also, it’s an age where your not too old, yet old enough to reflect a bit. You’re a girl, you have a right to be sappy. What’s my excuse? HAHA! Ok, I better get back to work now! Take care! =)
4 ab // Nov 23, 2004 at 12:43 pm
I am about to turn 30 & I had felt the same way until about 2 months ago. Then my 32-year-old friend found out she was pregnant for the first time. She told me that she thought she had lived through so much already. But now she has so much more to look forward to, it’s like she’s starting a whole new life. The point is, you’re not old. As long as you have good memories and you’re proud of what you’ve accomplished, that’s enough. There will be so many more memories ahead, you have no idea. Look forward to them & cherish the ones that have passed.
5 Mike // Nov 23, 2004 at 1:47 pm
29 is not old. My mom got married when she was 33, and had my oldest sister when she was 35. She then had four more kids. I was born when she was 40. And all five of us kids are happy and normal.
I’m freaking out about turning 30 in two weeks, but instead of fretting about it for the last year, I decided to take care of my health like I never did before. Over the last year I dropped 30 lbs., get 8 hrs. of sleep a night, eat healthy, go running and to the gym regularly. I’ll turn 30 in better shape than I was when I was 27. People say I look younger at almost 30 than I did when I was 27. Clearly, that can’t last forever, but the bottom line is that you have a lot of control over your health and how you feel.
Happy Thanksgiving from SF to Chicago (my hometown, where I’ll be tonight if O’Hare isn’t shut down from snow or wind.)
6 margaret // Nov 23, 2004 at 3:09 pm
great, now i look like a retard. thanks for nothing! and for the record, scarsdale is like 25 minutes outside the city.
7 tien // Nov 23, 2004 at 3:25 pm
i don’t know what a deer stand is. i assume it’s a perch to shoot from though.
8 Killian // Nov 24, 2004 at 9:14 am
I checked the year and it turns out that you are in fact old. Don’t listen to all those really old people trying to make it sound like you are still young- they are probably suffering from dementia or alzheimers. Cool ornaments tho!
9 rachelle // Nov 24, 2004 at 9:36 am
thanks, killian. you really know how to put a smile on a girl’s face!
really thanks, to everyone else for helping put things in perspective. and margaret, i don’t think I made you look dumb! I was just pointing out that we come from different backrounds.
10 mmeiser // Nov 24, 2004 at 12:46 pm
“I was just pointing out that we come from different backrounds…”
Yeah, it’s not your fault you came from a dumb background.
11 mom // Nov 24, 2004 at 3:06 pm
do I take that last commment personally?
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