9 posts tagged “holidays”

As I contemplate sleep and a multitude of other ways this moment might be better spent, a few things occur to me:

• Despite my former certainty that I had nothing to say this time last year, I was eight times more prolific then than I am this time this year.
• Despite my recent certainty that I was much more on the ball last year, evidence has proved that I hadn't unpacked or taken down Christmas decorations this time last year, either.
• Despite how much I hate the things I write as I write them, I always enjoy them one year later.

In conclusion, and on a mostly unrelated note...I love and hate words.  This personal dichotomy exists for more reasons than I could list out here or anywhere, but as a sample reason for each extreme:

• I love words because I can write something like the following within the teensy constraints of a 140 character Twitter tweet and intend three different meanings:

Faced with an old question: to read or to write? <pause> Perchance to sleep? ([mariaelaina] = less ambitious than Hamlet)

• I hate words because none of their meanings, here or anywhere, can give me meaning.

And on that heavier and sadder-sounding than intended or felt (damn words!) note, off I go for some much-needed sleep.

P.S.  Hooray for hyphens!

When I was a teenager, I was an insatiable writer.  I had many journals full of indulgent poems, each one teeming with loathing and complaints.  I'd scribble them down in too-thick handwriting from the safety of my room or bang them out on old-fashioned typewriters in semi-public spaces.  Typewriters were always optimally inspiring.  I've never gotten the hang of electronic composition.

Ten years later, I occasionally pull out my journals and read my bad poetry.  I see all kinds of things in my old musings -- scraps of insights, a surprising depth of feeling, and an occasional flirt with profundity.  Mostly, though, I see that I've been plagued with the same thoughts and feelings of self-doubt since I was 14 years old.  Consciously I feel different, wiser, better... but the proof is indisputable.  At least in part, I've been emotionally treading water for over a decade. 

To that end, I just re-read some of my blogging from this time last year:

"I wonder if I deceive myself when I look forward to feeling normal again?  That I hang in anticipation of those moments that are so consuming I don't bother comparing them to others I've had or might have in the future?  I can't help but feel that I'm in-between one place and another, and that there will be no rest for me until I arrive."

So here I am, with nothing new to say... yet again.  Perhaps I should just go eat some toast.

It's that time of year again, where the world is allegedly off somewhere falling in love and I'm dragging my Pigeon, kicking and screaming, into the holiday season.  I'm basking in the light of our majestic tree, Lonely Steve, sipping some Caramele tea from Lupicia, and considering the following holiday facts about my husband:

• He objects to sleigh bells in songs on principle.
• He's mentioned at least 5 times today that he bought me a present, that he won't tell me what it is, and that it will be arriving very soon.
• He was quite certain of imminent death while retrieving our Christmas decorations from the storage space in our garage, and told me so repeatedly.
• He's exceedingly proud of himself for naming our tree Lonely Steve, and for spotting said tree 30 seconds after we arrived at the lot.(*) 
  

And the way we spent our evening just about sums up the pervasive December dynamic:

ME:  Singing Christmas standards and bustling around the tree.
HIM:  Looking at photos of knives and drinking whiskey. 

Jingle, jangle, jingle.

* Note that we were at the lot for the better part of 30 minutes anyway, due to my Elaina-ness.

True to form, the commerce gods are pushing Christmas on me with a vengeance.  Don't misunderstand me -- I love this time of year -- but when the barista at Starbucks thrusts my latte at me with a "Merry Christmas!" the day after Thanksgiving, even I get a little concerned.  Would it be so terrible for "that time of year when the world falls in love" to last for just 30 days?  I perceive that every year it bleeds further back into November, and the shock wave ebbs further out into January.  Soon it will be either Christmas or bathing suit season all year long, and Hallmark will have a card and a holiday for all occasions in-between.

Also true to form, I spent around $500 this weekend.  All on myself.  "Oh boy!  Christmas time!  Let me go shopping... for me."  I don't know what to call this affliction, but it's happened every year since I first became gainfully employed.  Back in my Burger King days these sprees would be more along the lines of $25, but still.  It's the thought (?)  that counts. 

When I was younger, I'd at least maintain the delusion that the goal was to shop for other people.  I'd go out to the mall with the best of intentions and... you know, get distracted.  Somewhere along the way, though, I lost all the niceties.  I spent this weekend shopping for myself... do not pass go, do not collect $200.  I never once thought that I might pick up something for someone else, nor did I even look. 

The real mystery here is woven with some combination of the following facts: 1) I have plenty of stuff, and don't need any more, 2)  the people who love me would undoubtedly buy me -- as Christmas gifts -- all of these things that I buy for myself, 3)  these sprees greatly diminish the number of things I need or want, thus whittling my wish list down to scraps and gristle, 4) I love buying things for other people.

So yeah.  Not sure what to make of that.  And imagine how screwed I'll be when Christmas lasts from September 1st through March 30th, and how little money I'll have to spend on bathing suits once April rolls around.

*sings* Back to life, back to reality...

Blech.

It's a new year, and I want that fact to be refreshing or something like it.  Instead, I find the passing of last year and the birth of this new one relatively uneventful.  I'm not sure years are all that helpful a measure when it comes to every day life. 

So here I am, New Year's Day, letting the pieces and details of my every day life wash over me...

Back to the reality of two suitcases that need unpacking, a fully decorated house that will undoubtedly languish like a dried out Christmas tree well into January, and an annoying neighbor with a yappy dog who definitely did NOT move out on December 31st as planned. 

Back, too, to the reality of packed schedules, empty fridges, unread books, and a seemingly endless list of things to do no matter how many items I manage to cross off.

On top of everything else, back to work tomorrow.  Buggeration. 

I will try my best to be brave and strong, and to embrace these and other harsh realities before they knock me flat on my back. 

*musters strength and takes a deep breath*

• I accept that I spent $13.00 on yarn I don't like, and also that I didn't want to be a knitter to begin with.  Furthermore, I accept the countless hours I wasted trying to convince myself that I would like said yarn better if I tried a different pattern.
  
• I accept that I failed to clean my house 4 days in a row, and that I will probably continue to fail at it well into the middle of the week.
  
• I accept that cheese now equals pain and misery.
  
• I accept that I will never reconcile my past and my future, and that it is folly and a waste of the present to even try.
• I accept that about 95% of the time my toilet keeps running after I flush it, and that it doesn't stop until I go back into the bathroom and jiggle the handle.
  
• I accept that tomorrow's soccer game is going to be very tough after my two-week break.
• I accept that I never managed to use those cherries I froze back in September.
• I accept that I dwell on losses and let them distract me from everything that I have, and that I only notice this with great effort or when something passes from one category to the other.
  
• I accept that when I go see her on Friday, Dr. Habibi will probably yell at me for not flossing enough.
• I accept that I will most likely be expected to think and problem-solve in my 10AM meeting tomorrow, even though I haven't been awake at 10AM all weekend.
• I accept that I went crawling back to Netflix, tail tucked between my legs.
  
• I accept that many of the boys in my office but most especially Mark D. will always be better than me at Guitar Hero 2.
  

An okay first step.

As for the resolutions, I don't really make them.  They don't tend to motivate me very much.  I suppose if I resolve anything, it's to resolve less and do more.

I'm surrounded by picked-over plates of hors d'oeuvres and desserts.  Every single glass I own is dirty, and they're all strewn across my kitchen table or stacked up next to the sink.  There's an arrangement of sweaty cheese sitting on my bamboo cutting board, growing more questionable by the minute.  My recycling, which was emptied last night, is now piled high with empty bottles of beer and spirits.  The Pigeon is still tangled up in bed, stinking of whiskey and quite probably still drunk.

Evidentially, I'd say that last night's not-party was a success. 

Off I go to bake some cookies!

This past Sunday I subjected Richard to the many delights of making holiday merriment with me.  This exquisite, once-a-year sort of torture is typically inflicted by a parent or guardian, but seeing as we're on our own now I thought it was time to start a whole new tradition of pain and suffering. 

Ah, the fond memories I have:  lovingly placing ornaments on the tree only to have my mother move them to a more suitable location moments later, fearing for my life as I teetered precariously atop our feeble step ladder and attempted to correctly identify the staple end of the staple gun, cringing each and every time "Candy Cane Sugary Plum" scratched its way into my ears from the United-States-Airforce-issue LP that Pop inherited from his older brother Mike.

I pulled out my meager collection of decorations along with the 18 CDs of Christmas music my mom was nice enough to burn for me and set out to get my Christmas on.  I take it as a good sign, as I've been pointedly un-jazzed about Christmas since Pop died 4 years ago.

We were off to a promising start, as Saturday's impromptu massage trip to Watercourse Way unexpectedly led us to the perfect tree-topper:  a little silvered-glass bird. 

birdie

(For those who don't know, we have a weird thing for birds.  Not that weird, I suppose, relative to the whole wonderful world of weirdness... but it's a bit weird that we have any sort of thing for birds.  He's Pigeon.  I'm Dove.  Our house is the nest.  Our stuff is seed.  Seed is paramount.  It goes on and on, in a revolting couple-insider-joke kinda way.)

I dragged Richard to Target, where I tried to elicit his feedback on various things which were of absolutely no interest to him (e.g. what sort of stocking do you want, do you like this or that color bauble, should we try tying ribbons on the tree?).  He stayed buried in his phone as much as possible, finally fleeing for asylum in the portable electronics and gaming section.

2 hours and nearly $200 later, it was time to select a tree.  Unimpressed by the too-tall trees and too-large pricetags at Grandpa's Christmas Tree Lot (and, to Richard's point, the suspicious absence of anyone who looked even remotely like a grandpa), we headed over to the Summer Winds Nursery.  After establishing that there were no tree sizes between 1' Table-Top Trees and 6' Trees for Real Grownups That Probably Won't Fit In Your Small IKEA-Clad Apartment, we set out to pick "the one".  This easily took eight times longer than it needed to, and involved asking Richard many more inane questions to which he didn't know or didn't care to know the answers (e.g. is he too fat at the top, doesn't he look a little lopsided, are you sure he's not taller than him over there?). 

On the ride home (which offered no rest for the weary, because I insisted on playing Christmas music the entire way), we named our tree Phillip.  We then used him as a channel for slinging personal insults at each other on our way to pick up some hard-earned Starbucks.  For some inexplicable reason, Phillip has a voice like a girl.

Once the trimming and carrying and other man-jobs had been completed, Richard busied himself with work while I tore around the apartment like a maniac.  Lights went up, everyday knickknacks were swapped out for wintery ones, and the repugnant holiday classics blared from my JBL Creature Speakers.  There was bad singing and even worse dancing, and much serenading of Phillip.  There was also the breaking of two baubles in rapid succession, followed by me shrieking and Richard gently chastising.

I insisted that Richard help out on the home stretch, and I needed to restrain myself from relocating his ornaments just the way my mom used to relocate mine.  I did, however, make some casual placement recommendations.  :0)

I'm still reeling (or at least my tummy is) from the feast Chelsea prepared for us on Thursday.  Martha Stuart ain't got nothin' on my girl.

I've managed to stay in my PJs past noon for two days now.  I can't decide if I'm truly pleased with myself or merely trying to justify my own laziness.

I suppose that thus far, this weekend has been everything a holiday weekend should be.  I've spent all my time sleeping, eating, reading, and playing Mario (which, btw, I can play for ages now without losing all feeling in my left thumb... again, is this pride or just one of my many devices?).   I've put extremely lofty and complicated things on my to-do list such as "go to Coupa cafe," "drag out Christmas decorations," and "blog". 

Were I at home and were it a normal year, I'd be helping my mother retrieve box after box of Christmas decorations from the attic.  Lou Monte and The Time-Life Treasury of Christmas would be playing, my grandmother's trilly soprano would be ringing above the music from her post on the couch.  My dog would be pouting in some inconvenient spot in the middle of the living room floor, indignant that we were once again cluttering his domain with stuff that smells of attic. 

Since in three days my family is moving out of my childhood home where we've spent the last thirty-someodd years, we would probably be moving around different sorts of boxes this year.  The soundtrack and living room obstacle course would undoubtedly be the same.

Richard and I finally forced ourselves out of the confines of my living room to get some fresh air around 5:30 last night.  Until that moment, our only hint of the outside world was what came streaming through our windows.  Or in the case of our part-time cat, what came crawling through our windows.

It was deliciously brisk outside... just cold enough for us to think "it's cold" without actually being cold.  I wore my stripey gloves and Richard wore his gray scarf, a gesture on both our parts since this is Northern California and it couldn't have been cooler than 50 degrees.

Some time in the past week or so when I wasn't paying proper attention, the air stopped smelling like October and started smelling like November.  It's difficult to say exactly what I mean, but the easiest way to tell the difference between October air and November air is that November air smells much more like December air than October air does.  It has more fireplace in it, and is just starting to take on its first hints of evergreen and blue.

It made me miss nothing-in-particular very much.

november

Determined not to sleep away yet another perfectly good Saturday, I set the alarm for 9:00am.  Predictably, this resulted in me actually getting out of bed around 9:30, and coaxing a grumpy Pigeon out of bed about an hour after that.  A full week of soccer and social gatherings had left my house miserably devoid of food, so we set out for our typical weekend fare at Coupa Cafe.

Phrasing it in these terms makes it sound as though we were out the door in a blink, but that's never the way with us.  Two hours of drinking coffee, tooling around online, and watching the final scenes of Shaun of the Dead had us laggingly heading out for breakfast at 1:30pm.  I wasn't daunted, though, because we had a $20 gift card in-hand and had probably missed the lunch rush.

Or not.

As luck would(n't) have it, Coupa was packed to the rafters.  There wasn't a single table free -- not even outside.  The line hugged the entire length of the counter and refrigerator case, and extended back into the "These tables are reserved for two or more patrons with food orders only, please" room with the fireplace in it.  And in that crowd, not a single face I recognized.  Who are these people?  And where do they get their nerve?  Don't they know we're regulars? 

I've never been a regular anywhere before, so I feel entitled to a certain sense of entitlement when I go to Coupa.  We practically live there.  We've easily spent $1000 there since moving to Palo Alto in May.  Would it kill people to have a little deference?  If it were me infringing on someone else's turf (and it has been me more times than I can count), I would slink silently into an obscure corner like a thief in the night, move as little as possible while sipping my soy chai, and vacate the premises as quickly as consumption would allow.  These people were flamboyantly enjoying my space without any regard for my months of dedication, and it made my blood boil.

In fairness, yeseterday was one of those days when I generally hated just about everybody.  Let's be clear about this: I don't like hating, being annoyed by, and/or not trusting perfect strangers.  I can't embrace or even be indifferent to these kinds of feelings, which I think (hope?) is what distinguishes me from a real jaded person. 

Defeated and slightly annoyed, we headed elsewhere.  On our way back to University Avenue we did a little window shopping at Mansoor & Gore Jewelers, which one Yelp reviewer astutely notes is "the perfect antidote to chain jewelery stores."  I'm a sucker for unique, arsty jewelry, so I adore just about every piece this shop carries.  They had an entire case full of gorgeously rendered gold, white gold, and platinum bands, each perfectly considered down to the last detail.  While I don't want to be overly optimistic until I get a proper look next week, I think we've found the spot where we'll buy my wedding ring.  w00t.

We ended up eating an unremarkable but altogether tasty Mexican meal at Andale, then headed to Starbucks for our second cup of the day.  On our way across the street, a homeless man with no teeth approached us for change.

"Any spare change for a peep show?" Of course, he actually said "pizza" -- which makes a great deal more sense -- but the confusion is readily explained by the aforementioned lack of teeth.

Starbucks was in its usual holly-jolly holiday form.  Red cups, snow flake mugs, peppermint drinks, Christmas CDs, teddy bears bundled into tiny down jackets, holiday bean blends, gift cards wrapped in red felt envelopes.  It made me wish that the earth would swallow me whole. 

I haven't always hated the holidays.  In fact, it used to be one of my favorite times of year.  I was one of those sickening people who walk around humming Christmas tunes and lovingly stroke the evil little stuffed bears that show up in Starbucks way-too-early.  

To be completely cliche and depressing about it, the holidays started to unravel for me when my Pop died a week before Christmas a few years ago.  Since he was a man deeply in love with God, his family, and good food, Christmas marked the high-point of his year.  He had every album, every knickknack, every sqaure inch of his house decorated.  When I went away to college, one of his main priorities was to ensure that I had tree in my dorm -- he went out and purchased me a small "Charlie Brown Christmas tree" just so I wouldn't miss out on the cheer while fretting over my end of term papers.

You can't imagine how it all makes me miss him now.

Add to that my increasing loss of a sense of family.  For better or worse, holidays will always be all about family in my mind.  Don't get me wrong... I have a wonderful family who is a hugely important part of my life.  Unlike the days of my youth, however, they're not a regular part of my daily life.  They're not, to put it bluntly, in my face all the time. 

I'm not trying to say that having your family forced upon you day in and day out -- adjusting every minute detail of your schedule to the all-consuming shared schedule, having them poke into every corner of your stuff and your business, being unable to do the things you want without constant criticism -- isn't annoying.  I'm merely saying that it wraps you up in something intangibly wonderful... something that I often notice is absent from my life now.  As much as I wish it were so, my friends and even my Pigeon can't give me that same feeling.  I'd like to think this is partially because they were carefully chosen by me rather than assigned to me.  It also doesn't hurt that they can't or won't bring themselves to torture me in that pointedly familial way. 

The last four paragraphs compressed into a tight little ball and bowled into my gut while I was waiting for my Americano.  This lead to big, swelling tears, which I quickly tried to brush away before making an ass of myself.  Crying in Starbucks.  Super.  All that suffering and my coffee wasn't even good.

On our way back to the car, that same homeless man with no teeth asked me for change again.  I said in a perhaps-too-snippy tone, "I just gave you all of my change," to which he simply replied, "Oh," before shuffling away to his next conquest.  I can't count how many times I've chastised myself for failing to recognize the unique humanity in each every person I see on the streets -- for grouping them together dismissively.  This was an ironic turn for me.  I certainly don't expect to be the shining, salvational star to each and every person to whom I give some change, but you'd think he'd remember me from 5 minutes before.

Outside Hahn's Hibachi we saw two small birds lying inexplicably dead on the sidewalk.  There's nothing particularly remarkable about it, but it's the kind of thing that makes you search your mind for something remarkable that you might be failing to glom onto.  We stopped and stared down at their sad, unmoving little bodies for what seemed like a long time.

After a moment or two Richard said, "It's sad to see them so still. They're meant to be so full of life."

He was exactly right, and the fact that he would notice and say something like that with an earnest melancholy in his voice is exactly why I love him.