Susan Fanetti

I generally love the holidays and dive head-first into all the happy chores of making the season magical—decorating, cooking and baking, gift shopping and wrapping, the whole sparkly ball of fun. When our sons were kids, I worked hard—and eagerly—to make the holiday as special as I could, even in my single-mom days, when the budget was beyond tight and the only gifts I could afford either came from my own hands or from the dollar store. I carried on important traditions from my own childhood and built new ones with my kids.

Seventeen years ago, when my husband, our youngest son, and I moved from Missouri to California while the older, freshly grown boys stayed back, holidays changed for us quite a bit—we’ve been all together to celebrate only a handful of times in these years, and it’s harder to get excited to cook a big dinner for such a small holiday. Also, though I absolutely adore California, it doesn’t snow or even get particularly cold here in the Sacramento area, and it took several years to learn to feel Christmasy in hoodie weather. Even so, I’ve tried to hold the key traditions as much as possible.

Despite the general lack of weather that could support Frosty the Snowman, if our older boys could or would move to California (they can’t and won’t; they’re well established back home), we would never leave. The main reason we’re planning to return to the Midwest in a couple years (after we’re both fully retired) is to reunite the family—which means I get those big, magical holidays back at last.

I think maybe this is why the holidays come up in many of my stories—if I can’t have the huge family gathering myself, I can invent one for characters and have myself a little vicarious cheer.

To be honest, sometimes being so far away from half our brood hits me hard. There have been a few holidays when I barely bothered—didn’t decorate or bake or do anything but gifts. (The years when the boys only wanted—needed—money, and gift giving was about Venmo, were especially rough.)

This year is an odd one. 2025 has been challenging for many, perhaps most of us in a lot of serious ways. The whole country, the whole planet, is going through it these days. It feels like every single day brings a new thing to make us scared or angry or hopeless. The temptation to think “Christmas schmistmas, let’s call the whole thing off” is strong in me this year.

But I’ve decided not to give into that bleak bullshit, even though our family won’t be together.

Instead, I’m going full OPERATION KLAUS, pulling out ALL the decorations on Saturday and filling this house with so much light and sparkle it’ll look like a North Pole disco. I’m baking ALL the cookies. I’m gonna blast Bing Crosby and Nat King Cole Christmas standards in the car and get the bass going like they’re Kendrick. We’re watching a full month’s worth of holiday specials and movies. We’re even gonna do Christmas crafts, dammit!

This year, I’m not handing the holiday over to cynicism and despair, nor depression and overwhelm. This year, I’m throwing glitter in their faces.

Call it Radical Joy.

Whether your life is going well now or you’re in deep struggle, I wish you peace and love during this holiday season and always. If you are going through it, I hope you find ease and comfort soon.

I hope you’re able to find some radical joy of your own. ❤️

s—