I am Irish. Well, technically I am half Irish and half Mexican. Okay, okay… if you want to get really technical I am half Mexican, almost half Irish with a smattering of German and a teeny pinch of English. The point is the middle of March is a busy time for me and my family.
Growing up, the 17th of March has always been a big deal. We have marched in a little, local parade for going on three decades. It is a rag-tag group of families walking down the streets of Dogtown, yelling at friends and neighbors and waving to random strangers like bawdy runner’s-up in a d-list beauty pageant. Like our pageant counter parts we take great care in our appearance. Unlike the beauty queens, our garments usually involve smart-aleck tee-shirts in shades of emerald and jade with complementary bright green hued feather boas, socks and hats. It is a sight to see.
Needless to say, we don’t take ourselves too seriously. This year we marched under the banner of “The Real Housewives of Dogtown” with my 80-something year old great aunt waving from a convertible. We threw plastic cabbages, snakes and beads to the crowd; who screamed for them like they were made of real emeralds and not cheap bits of plastic. It was a great time.
For the past few years I have kind of taken the parade for granted. We would show up, act rowdy for the day and then pack away our green gear until next year. That was until my aunt sent out a message stating that this was the last year we would march, unless someone else wanted to take the reins. Now it seems as if it is up to my generation to carry on the tradition. This has me thinking about family, and traditions, about what is too important to let fade away. In the next couple of weeks I will write about my family, the ragtag group of people who surround me every day. These amazing stories that are too cool to simply fade into memory.
I hope you like them.
How quickly the time flies. It has been a couple of weeks since I have been able to devote any time to my blog, and surprisingly I missed it. The past few weeks have been intense, hectic and fun. Before these memories are erased by a new school semester, a new year and the average running that makes up my life, I thought I should write them down. I wanted to take a look at some of the moments that made this holiday special, the ordinary moments I tend to forget by February. Here is my list:
There was the moment you run into an old friend and you are able to pick up right where you left off. In my case it had been twelve years, and it seems a cup of coffee was all it took to pick right back up. Oh, the simple joys of easy friendships.
The moment that you realize your kiddo is paying attention. Madison picked up a bell, a Christmas decoration, and started ringing it as hard as her chubby little arms would let her. She started yelling, “Who has money? Who has money?” I asked my little bell ringer what she was doing and she replied, “Getting money for the people who don’t have any.” Lesson learned.
My sister was quick to point out that the Salvation Army bell ringers hang out in places of commerce, like outside of grocery stores and shopping malls. She thought it was a sign that I shop to much, and she may be right. Instead I chose to think that my wanton consuming at the holiday season can have an educational affect on my daughter as well as a slimming affect on my wallet. Not to mention the positive effects on the economy. That’s my story and I am sticking to it. The moment that I realized denial and rationalization has yet to fail me.
There was also the moment that my dear friend graduated from college. I was caught off guard with all of the things I wanted to tell her. I wanted to say that it seemed a shame that her hard work was overshadowed by the hustle and bustle of the holiday season. I wanted to tell her how amazing it was that she put herself through school, while working full time and supporting herself. I wanted to tell her that she was an inspiration to me. No matter what life threw her way including bad boyfriends, awful bosses, layoffs and bad luck in general; she never ever gave up. I wanted to say all of these things and more, but couldn’t figure out a way that didn’t sound condescending or trite. Instead I just bought her a kick-ass graduation gift; another nod to my philosophy that retail therapy can work wonders when you can’t find the words.
There was the moment, sitting down to breakfast at my in-laws, that I was truly thankful for holiday traditions. Especially if the traditions are as delicious as breakfast casserole and Christmas cookies. Some of my in-laws’ traditions are very different than what I grew up with. For example, they always took turns opening one present at a time whereas my family was a wrapping paper free-for-all. This year there was also the moment that I realized how much their traditions have become my own as well; that I love opening presents one at a time and eating Christmas cookies with breakfast.
There was the moment when I was finally ready to host Christmas dinner. That moment of peace when you realize that everything is done; the house is clean, the gifts are wrapped the food prepared. This moment happened thirty minutes before everyone arrived so it was a little later than I would have liked, but it was a nice moment none the less.
The moment that the family descended on the house and the feasting began. The chaotic rush of present opening and eating and laughing; there is nothing like it at any other time in the year. This was a moment of mixed emotions, since it was the first Christmas since my parents divorced and the first year that one of us kids hosted Christmas. (I am the oldest and the bossiest so naturally I called dibs on Christmas. Very mature, I know.) Somewhere in the hustle of the evening I looked around at my family and had a realization. We will all be okay. The holidays are different now, and there was that weird moment when my mom and my dad gave my sister identical gifts. (awkward) But despite it all, this was the first holiday when it didn’t feel so tense. This was the moment that I realized that things will get easier.
There was the moment, on the 26th, as I cleaned up the house that I finally realized how much wine we drank the night before. Champagne and wine and then Baileys… and spiked hot cocoa… Bottles clanking, I took the empties out to the recycling and realized I didn’t even have a wisp of a hangover. No headache, no wonky stomach…. It was a Christmas MIRACLE!
But the best moments, by far, where the moments I was able to see Christmas as my three year old daughter saw it. There was the excitement driving past houses that would put the Griswolds to shame, with a blow up nativity next to a waving Santa Claus. There was the moment that we set out cookies and milkbones for Santa and the reindeer. (Reindeer LOVE dog treats.) And then the moment that she realized that Santa had eaten the treats she left for him. There was the moment that she was FINALLY allowed to open her Christmas presents. And the moment she was FINALLY able to give us the gift she had made in pre-school. Christmas can really test a kid’s patience. The gift was a lovely picture frame made of tongue depressors and buttons. There was the moment that she had to give us all check-ups with her new doctor’s kit and the moment I caught her sneaking Christmas candy; her cheeks stuffed with chocolate like a PMS-ing chipmunk.
As I write these I realize that I could keep going for days, so I guess I will add one more moment, a moment that happened just now. This is the moment I realize how very lucky I am. This is a moment I won’t soon forget no matter how busy life gets. (Well, at least I will try.)
Last night the semester officially ended for me. Now, I am a thirty-something year old woman; yet without fail the official moment school ends each semester Alice Cooper starts to sing in my head… School’s out for summer! School’s out forever!!! Those are the only two lines I know, so the song gets a little repetitive very quickly.
Yes there is a bliss, however brief, that comes with the moment school ends. It is reminiscent of early summer days as a child, when summer vacation yawns before you chock full of endless possibilities. The same bliss accompanied the moment Christmas vacation started; two weeks filled with Christmas parties and enough cookies to even make Santa queasy. The holiday specials on television, especially Charlie Brown’s Christmas (I have a soft spot for spindly little trees) helps to make the season bright. As does driving around looking at holiday light displays, with thermoses of hot cocoa and extra marshmallows; I am a sucker for sparkle. These are just a few of my favorite things…
Things that I love (winter edition):
- When you turn on the television to unexpectedly find a marathon of your favorite show the same day you are stuck at home cleaning the house.
- Waking up to find a snow on the ground and realizing that you didn’t have to leave anyway.
- Putting on a pair of pajamas fresh out of the dryer.
- Fuzzy slipper socks
- Finding your favorite wine on super sale.
- When your husband unloads the dishwasher, washes the dishes or cleans anything without being asked. (better than oysters as an aphrodisiac, listen up all you men out there)
- A hug from your kiddo just because she loves you.
- Snuggling on the couch, discovering a Charlie Brown Christmas with your three year old.
Anyone one of these things is enough to send me into a blissful stupor. But in the last couple of weeks all of these moments have occurred at least once. (Okay, okay I am officially addicted to putting my jammies in the dryer before I put them on.) Forgive me if I break into song:
(to the tune of the Julie Andrews staple, Favorite Things)
A clean house surprise and good wine on sale
Criminal minds marathon while on cleaning detail
Brightly colored socks made with fuzzy warm strings
These are a few of my favorite things…
When your boss bites
When your cars dinged
When the wine goes bad…
I simply remember my favorite things, and then I don’t feel soooo BAD!
Alice Cooper and Julie Andrews in the same blog post… what a good day.
Filed under: Holidays | Tags: attitude, christmas, holidays, stress, traditions
‘Tis the season to be crazy; falalalala la la la SCREAM! This is the song I have been singing lately. Catchy, right? I love the holiday season, but it seems each year it gets a little more hectic. When I wake up Christmas morning it is not with the bliss one might expect, but more like a holiday hangover after too much eggnog. I look around and wonder, what happened to the Christmas season?
I know I was there for it. I vaguely recall shopping and cooking and decorating but the images are blurry. And not unlike a bad hangover, I wake up slightly panicked that one way or another I will embarrass myself, with a forgotten gift or a package mix up. (No dad, I was not trying to make a statement by giving you earrings. Yes I know you could totally pull them off if you wanted to.)
With all the rushing and the planning I feel like I never really stop to appreciate the season. A situation I exacerbated by installing new carpet last week. (P.S. You know you are a grown-up when you ask for new carpet for Christmas.) For three days last week I felt like I belonged on one of those reality shows for hoarders. Everything we owned was stuffed into our kitchen and our bedroom with little trails to the front and back door. My attitude is directly proportional to my surroundings. If I had to describe my mood last week the best depiction could only be: completely, off-the-wall, insane, nut-bag. My husband was thrilled.
Did I mention that it was finals time? Brilliant thinking on my part, wouldn’t you say?
So this week I decided it was time for an attitude adjustment, and not just by the glass. (You may have noticed from previous posts that I like wine.) This week I decided to make an effort to enjoy the season. I also decided to take some time to put my head in a better place, as in not SUPER crabby.
So on Tuesday we went to see Christmas lights. Several million twinkling lights and a super excited three year old is bound to put a smile on anyone’s face. I could feel my inner Grinch melting away. We oohhed and aahhed as we turned each corner and drove through sparkling tunnels of light. We stopped at the petting zoo and made several new friends. (Apparently I am very popular with camels. Who knew? I will post a picture later.)
On Wednesday I went to the salon and got my hair done. Nothing makes me feel better than having someone cover all of my grey while gossiping about Glee and Justin Timberlake. Despite the yucky weather I left the salon with a spring in my step and swish of my hair; singing “All I Want for Christmas” and harnessing my inner Mariah Carey the whole way home. I swear I hit notes that only dogs could hear, but I don’t care.
Today I woke up and got a massage before heading off into the shopping fray. A little lavender scented oils and an awesome heated massage table is a great attitude adjustment on a cold winter’s day. The line at the post office didn’t seem nearly as annoying. And the crowds in Target didn’t seem nearly so nasty, I even noticed a couple of smiles as I walked down the aisles. That may have had something to do with the Mariah Carey Christmas on my Ipod… and the fact that I forget how loud I sing when I have my ear buds in. Or it could just be the Christmas spirit, who I am to say?
So now, attitude adjusted I am ready for Christmas a full week ahead of schedule. I am ready to soak it all in and revel in the holiday spirit. Tomorrow, my inner Grinch banished, I am going to bake holiday cookies until I run out of room in my kitchen (or I get sick of raw cookie dough, but I really think I will run out of space before that happens.) I am going to I am going to catch up with old friends and drink hot cocoa with my family. And if I feel my inner Scrooge trying to rear his ugly head, I will just drown him with peppermint schnapps. It’s seems like the Christmas-y thing to do.
Around this time of year I tend to get a little nostalgic. While reveling in the traditional feasting festivities I reminisce on holiday’s past. Like the time my sister screwed up the pumpkin pie because she didn’t know how to work the oven. And then there was the following year, also known as the second time my sister screwed up the pumpkin pie and the year after that, the time my sister became the permanent designated salad maker.
One story sticks out in particular this time of year. It is a story that brings a smile to my face every time. Please note that the names have been changed to protect the not so innocent.
It was 1998 and I lived in a small town in the middle of America. I was on my own and simultaneously loving and hating every minute of it. Loving the fact that I could drink to my heart’s content, but hating the fact that I could rarely afford both food and beer; I was your typical early twenty-something. I surrounded myself with other angst ridden, blissfully bohemian and broke people. We were the outcasts and proud of it; we lived on the edge of society, flouting the rules and mores of the social order we dyed our hair in Technicolor shades, drank on a school night and got tattoos… Oh, and we all worked at the mall, truly gansta.
As retail lackeys many of my friends were not going to make it home for Thanksgiving, the day after being the traditional running of the consumers in malls all over America. (Take that Pamplona, you and your stupid bulls.) Our goofy band of friends decided not to let this bring us down and vowed to have the first (and last) “Island of Misfit Toys” Thanksgiving. (Yes, that was a Rudolph the Reindeer reference. One of my friends was a little Goth and had a passion for all things slightly creepy.) The party was going to be at our modest two bedroom apartment with efficiency kitchen. You can already see that this was a bad idea.
The small space was no problem to our ragtag bunch of friends; the five of us would happily eat anywhere. Then Anna, my roommate got a call from her mom who wanted to spend the holiday with her daughter and was willing to make the three hour drive to do so. A few hours later her father called, he didn’t want his little girl to be alone on Thanksgiving and he too would make the drive. Did I mention that her parents were very unhappily divorced and had not been in the same room for years? No biggie, we had plenty of food… and wine. What more would we need?
We spent Wednesday morning gleefully shopping for the feast. I was in charge of the mashed potatoes and the turkey. I had never cooked a turkey, but how hard could it be? Wednesday evening we were ready to go, with hours to spare… why not go out for a bit?
Did you know that the Wednesday night before Thanksgiving is the biggest bar night of the year? This is because all of the eligible bar-going twenty-somethings have nothing more to do the next day but get up and binge eat, and then nap and then binge eat again. This is your average hangover cure anyway so the plan is pretty solid. That is, unless, you plan on cooking the next day. We were beginning to see the error in our little misfit holiday. There was no canceling though, since parents were involved. We decided to do the responsible thing… and go out, but only for a little bit. After all, we had to be up REALLY early to cook the turkey.
At the risk of making a long story even longer I will just give you a synopsis of the evening. We ended up at an epic party; there was a hello kitty back pack stocked with gin & tonics, a twister board, a Ouija board and 311 blasting on a CD player. I vaguely recall jello shots and a room filled with black lights. (It was the nineties, don’t judge.) Needless to say we did not make it home early.
We got home at five-thirty in the morning. Anna stumbled into her room and passed out in immediately. I debated staying up for the two hours before the turkey had to be in the oven and decided it was the best plan. After all, I could sleep after the bird was in the oven. I decided to review the recipe and directions on the turkey. Did you know that you have to remove things from INSIDE of the turkey? Did you know that this is one thousand times worse when a hangover is setting in? By the way, there is a reason that your body tries to sleep when you are drunk, the beginning of a hangover is WAY worse than it is after sleeping for a bit. I managed to get the turkey prepped and in the oven, and flopped into bed.
I had only just begun to drift off when I heard a crashing from the bathroom. I rushed to the closed door and asked Anna if she was ok. A muffled yes was all I heard before stumbled back to bed.
At noon I awoke to a banging on the front door, it was Anna’s mom. She was an hour early. I quickly threw on some clothes and picked up empties from last night on the way to the door. There she stood, with an armful of pies and a frown on her face. “I thought you guys would be up by now,” she said looking around. “Where’s Anna?”
I told her she woke up early to help with the turkey and was taking a little nap. I was silently congratulating myself for my quick thinking when Anna’s mom told me a story that stopped me in my tracks. She told me that she was so glad we were cooking this year, since in the years past Anna has made a habit of going out the night before Thanksgiving, getting wasted and ruining the meal the next day. I won’t go into the gory details, but needless to say Anna’ mom was pleased we took the initiative to cook this Thanksgiving in lieu of reveling the night before. I smiled and nodded. After all, who was I to ruin Thanksgiving for her?
I thought my ruse had worked until Anna’s mom decided to use the restroom. Remember that crashing sound I heard earlier? Flash back to Anna’s evening. First of all, cheap gin is never a good idea. Did I not mention we were broke? The cheap stuff was all we could afford. Anna, after sleeping for a bit, recognized that the bathroom was a safer place to be. Let’s just say she started to get a little queasy. As she sprinted to the bathroom she realized she was going to be there for a while and grabbed her feather pillow. On the way she tripped over her dog, an adorable little mutt that Anna loved more than life. In her effort to not hurt the dog she stumbled on her pillow ripping it open. She fell into the bathtub. In her attempt to break her fall she grabbed onto anything she could on the way down, in this case it was a full bottle of shampoo. The pressure of her weight popped the lid off and spewed the sticky substance all over.
Back to her mom opening the bathroom door… to a tarred (or should I say shampooed) and feathered Anna on the ground. Feathers were smeared on the mirror and hanging from the toilet tank. Anna looked like a half-plucked chicken asleep on the floor. Cue Anna’s Dad at the front door. Needless to say, neither was very pleased with us.
Anna’s mom helped clean the bathroom, after helping to clean Anna, which took several showers since the shampoo and feathers were tough to get out the first time around. Her dad assisted with dinner and with the clean up, and all in all it wasn’t too bad of a holiday especially after we had our after dinner naps. Anna even managed to choke down a few bites turkey before returning to bed.
I guess this story comes to mind because, believe it or not, it reminds me of what I am thankful for. I am thankful for my capricious youth and the good times that I have had. I am thankful that I made some very bad decisions including the three months I had purple hair. I am also very thankful that those times in my life are over. I am thankful that I can afford to have my hair done in normal and fairly natural colors. I am thankful that I can afford to drink decent red wine, even if it is only in moderation. I am thankful for my family even as I am cursing them for tracking mud through my house.
In the past few weeks I have been invited to several Thanksgiving Eve parties, all of which I respectfully declined. I am happy to stay at home and bake my husband’s favorite pumpkin cheesecake for tomorrow. I am happy to let someone else take care of the turkey. I am happy to watch my daughter play contentedly while I putter around the kitchen. I am happy to drink a glass (or three) of really good red wine. No cheap gin allowed.
So to end this Thanksgiving Story:
And she said with a grin as she poured another glass,
Happy Thanksgiving to all, lets binge eat en masse!
P.S. Did I mention I am really thankful for red wine?
a life just ordinary 