A quick Merry Christmas to all!
Revisiting 2021 as we celebrate the end of 2022
I just wanted to write a quick note to wish each and every one of you a Merry Christmas, and Happy Holidays no matter what your family celebrates.
This is a time for family and friends to come together without prejudice, in full acceptance and celebration of their individual differences. Needless to say, the last few years have presented serious challenges to this status quo.
One year ago, I and my partner Sam were told that we were not welcome at my family’s Christmas because Bonnie Henry, our provincial health officer, said it was illegal to have certain people at your house - depending on if they had opted to receive a specific pharmaceutical product, with the correct number of doses.
This broke my heart. Neither Sam or I were sick, and there was no reason at all to believe we were a health risk to my dad, stepmother or sister. What really got me, though, was the fact that after my mildly-under-the-weather sister did test positive for SARS-CoV-2 on a rapid antigen test, my dad decided it was the only reasonable course of action to have her come over anyway. After all, she fit Dr. Henry’s criteria for acceptable holiday guests. He then sequestered her to the bottom floor where she remained in “isolation”.
I told my dad exactly what I thought of this hypocritical and contradictory decision, and how it made me feel. It was the worst Christmas of my entire life, but that wasn’t even the point. He was no longer thinking logically about anything related to COVID-19, and quite literally told me he was “following orders.” He didn’t appreciate my reminding him of the historical significance of that comment.
Thankfully, honesty was the best policy and my instinct was correct: my dad didn’t intend to cause me or Sam harm, and I give him the benefit of the doubt that he truly did think he was doing the right thing for the safety of everyone involved - as ludicrous as that sounds. The point is that family is always the point of Christmas, and family calls for an extraordinary level of understanding. Screw amnesty - that’s the wrong word. Forgiveness, however, is the right word. I forgive my dad.
Though biological family was far away in 2021, friends were not. Dr. Steven Pelech of the Canadian Covid Care Alliance and his wife Cathy hosted an absolutely wonderful Christmas dinner and included me and Sam in the festivities. For the first time since 2020, I felt truly among a new sort of “family” - the kind you choose out of a community of likeminded people. These folks approached each other with the same uncontested kindness and forgiveness that keeps families together, and this was exactly the kind of spirit Sam and I needed at that time. We even got a bit of a kick out of the fact that according to Bonnie Henry, we were “illegally gathering” contrary to public health orders.
Bonnie Henry was wrong, both on the law and morally. We weren’t acting out a speakeasy-style “gathering of the unvaccinated” - entirely the opposite, in fact. Medical decisions were explicitly not included in the selection process for who was invited to the party. That’s the whole point. Nobody had any clue whether or not the other had been injected with this particular mRNA genetic vaccine product, or any other pharmaceutical. Sure, maybe it came up in conversation between people sitting beside each other at the table over turkey, but nothing more. In the end, Sam and I walked away with full bellies and warm hearts.
This year, Sam and I got the best of both worlds. At the beginning of December, we sat and dined with dozens of British Columbia’s bravest healthcare workers and our new friends hosted by Dr. York Hsiang and his wife Beverly. Discretion stops me from naming more names than I have, but needless to say we were among fantastic company. Then, just three days ago, Sam and I returned to my dad’s house with my sister to celebrate an early Christmas all together once again.
There is no going back to “normal”, but that doesn’t mean we need to fall into anyone else’s idea of a “new normal”. Life is what we make it, and I choose to make it holly and jolly.
There was something else that happened in 2021. My cousin Blair Farthing is a producer for CTV Morning Live, a news program in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. I had previously performed in-studio in 2019, and to help celebrate last Christmas, Blair asked me to film a follow-up performance of a Christmas classic.
I chose Silent Night. As we gather with friends and family today, in whatever form it takes this year, I invite you to spend just a moment of your downtime and enjoy this song.
Merry Christmas everyone, and wishing you a joyful final week of 2022!
Merry Christmas, Liam and Sam!
Merry Christmas to you both! Lovely performance of Silent Night! ❤️