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In the hospital for Christmas

Arthur G. White

When I think back upon half-a-century’s celebrations of Christmas, two recollections come immediately to mind. Both times I was in the hospital. Both were times of pain and prolonged immobility. Both also included gatherings of good friends and family, surrounding me with kindness.

Although I received a procession of well-meaning visitors during the first three days of my hospitalization for encephalitis in 1959, it wasn’t until Christmas Day itself that my pain became manageable enough for me to appreciate the company of those who brought well-wishes and prayers.

That year, I was involved in a pastoral care internship in a large mental hospital. Among my visitors on Christmas Day was the organist for our worship services, himself a long-time patient with whom I spent considerable time since I also conducted the choir (such as it was). He had gotten a day pass to “visit his sick friend”.

Al came into the room so quietly, I was taken aback to look up and see him standing by the curtain divider. He didn’t say much, really. It was I who more or less visited him, you might say, talking at length about Christmases of a childhood he never outgrew. Al’s home for the past 29 years had been among 6,000 crazy inmates on the back ward of a turn-of-the-century asylum: devoid of privacy, good news or any personal ownership other than whatever would fit into a footlocker.

“I’ll be heading back now,” he said abruptly. “We’re having turkey and ice cream for dinner.” His eyes brimming, he squeezed my hand and whispered in words barely audible, “This is the first real Christmas I’ve had in almost 30 years. Thank you.”

A half-dozen years later, I accidentally blew up my furnace, suffering burns to the greater portion of my upper body, and was hospitalized for nine days. Christmas fell on the sixth day of my recovery. At first, I was grateful to be slathered forehead-to-naval with Butesin Picrate, a butter-coloured, pain-relieving balm, but soon I was itching to get home. Itching is a good sign when you’re on the mend from second-degree burns, but my “itching” was the product of institutional boredom and seasonal distractions. Midday naps and roaming the halls were no substitute for a holy, holiday Christmas at home and church.

I awoke on the 25th to find a huge banner stretched across one wall of my semi-private, one-occupant room. It read: “I’m dreaming of an ochre Christmas.” On the bedstand was a single yellow rose with the caption: “Lo a rose ere blooming”. There were yellow slippers where my plaid ones had been, and a yellow hospital gown draped across the chair. There was a foot-tall, yellow balsam tree by the window (with blinking yellow lights). Even the Kleenex was . . . you guessed it.

On the floor were over-size yellow footprints leading out of the room, down the hall and into the visitors’ lounge: a room festooned with streamers, hanging cutouts, tinsel and gifts – all Butesin yellow. There were gifts galore from a wide conspiracy of friends and acquaintances, including five floor nurses, four senior highs, three pastor friends and two church school teachers. There was even a partridge in a pear tree – ochre, of course.

I didn’t make it home for Christmas during either of my hospitalizations, but “home” surely made it to me. That’s part of the Holy Season, isn’t it – friends and family celebrating closeness together, remembering, renewing, healing, embracing, giving? It brought me to tears back then . . . and still does today.

Arthur G. White lives in Clementsvale, Nova Scotia.

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Last modified December 9, 1999.

© 1999 Mennonite Brethren Herald.
Published by the Canadian Conference of MB Churches.
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