Christmas Day 2007

People who know me know that I deplore Christmas. I hate it like I hate the cellulite on my ass. I hate it like I hate cold french fries. I hate it like I hate snow. So you get that I hate Christmas, right? I guess it is all the 'have get presents'. Maybe it is all the "cheer" that seems to appear only during the days between Thanksgiving and Christmas Day, but is absent for the rest of the year. I guess it is all the build up to "make the day magical" or whatever idiot feeling advertisers are selling the particular year. Maybe it is the fact that I have to spend all day with my immediate family, while secretly waiting for the "shoe to drop".

Today (you cant see, but I just knocked on my wood and glass coffee table) the shoe didn't drop. No really. I made the trek to my aunts house for breakfast, which turned into lunch and then finally dinner. I just sat around and chatted with my cousins, just like we used to when we were kids, before people got married, divorced, had kids, got jobs, got raises, purchased houses and got their own lives. No presents, no pomp and circumstance. Just us, food, laughter, and connection.

We shared the latest family gossip. We endured my father's "stories and deep revelations" (all told and listened to before, but accepted as "brand new" by all of us). We shared what was new in our lives since the last time we talked (we had A LOT to share). We each bounced around the ideas we had in mind for the directions our individual lives might take in the new year.

I was reminded of a bunch today, I am not sure how or why I forgot:

1. My aunt is a much better cook than my mom and dad (or me for that matter).
2. My cousin Michelle is mad talented, but she took time out to remind us all that we were just as talented as she was.
3. My cousin Amanda can bake and should really consider opening some sort of business. However she needs to know that I won't patronize her personally because I'd be fat again.
4. My father is a simple man, but he makes things more complicated than they need to be. He doesn't mean to but.... (this is another blog entry).
5. My entire family is "mad" funny (in all the ways you think mad), but we are also very fortunate and very blessed.
6. I don't hate Christmas (this year) as much as I thought I did.
7. My cousin Pebble's daughter is really very skinny, but then again so was her mother.
8. I can do whatever I dream that I can do. I was reminded of that while eating vegetable dip.
9. The name of the "funk" my mother has around this time every year is called Seasonal Depressive Disorder (or something like that).
10. Things don't have to be big to be the best. Today was indeed a great example.

HOW COOL IS ALL OF THAT?!? Very.