{"id":1751,"date":"2019-12-26T20:53:55","date_gmt":"2019-12-26T18:53:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.danamladin.com\/?p=1751"},"modified":"2025-08-14T19:34:50","modified_gmt":"2025-08-14T17:34:50","slug":"craciun-fericit-te-poate-lovi-din-plin","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.danamladin.com\/en\/2019\/12\/craciun-fericit-te-poate-lovi-din-plin\/","title":{"rendered":"Merry Christmas (may hit you) from all perspectives!"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Some years ago, going to the cemetery on December 25th<\/sup>,\nthree months after the death of my sister, the people there greeted us\nserenely, with “Merry Christmas!” I found the greeting so… absurd\nin that context of suffering, that I didn’t know what to answer! And I still do\nnot know today.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Starting from that moment, I learned to say “Have a\nquiet Christmas”, “a beautiful one”, “a rich\nChristmas” and so on, rather than “happy”. Because you don’t\nknow how such a beautiful word can, paradoxically, open some deep wounds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For someone who has lost their child, for someone who has\nbeen abandoned, for someone who is ill, for someone who has been fired from\nwork, for someone who fails to have children, for someone who has buried their\nparent, there is no “Merry Christmas”\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

“John, come, the dead man is at the back gate!” a\nwoman shouts at the gate of the cemetery. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now I don’t find anything strange anymore, nothing is scary\nanymore.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Before, I wouldn’t have entered a cemetery for anything in\nthe world. I missed funerals, avoided living close to a cemetery in the\nneighborhood, even refused to listen to the stories related to them. I just\ncouldn’t.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For 11 years, each and every weekend, I go to the cemetery.\nFirst, I went there for my sister, and since almost two years ago, for my\nfather too. But also for other relatives of ours. It became kind of a reflex\ngesture… Abnormally so, as a psychologist told me. And I can believe that,\nconsidering that very few (always the same) people come to the cemetery like\nus, being present there each and every weekend. Or, to quote my mother,\n“we do our duty”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But how can you tell your parents not to go weekly to their\nchild’s grave? For them, that would have meant abandonment…<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I became a specialist in types of candles, lanterns and\nmatches, in cutting plastic bottles (made vases for the flowers) or in scrapping\nmelted wax.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the last 11 years, I have become good friends with all\nthe dogs in the cemetery. Generation after generation\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n