Hey Jakey,
Search string of the day that actually brought someone to my blog:
"could itchy hands, feet and back be due to an allergy to LadyBugs"
I can only imagine. I hope the searcher found the answer to his/her question. It could be serious. My guess, however, would be that there may be an allergy to the flowers/plants that the ladybugs are hanging out upon. But I'm not an allergist.
So last Sunday on my way to work, I was listening to Garrison Keillor on the Prairie Home Companion show. He was reflecting on his most memorable Christmases, good and bad. It got me thinking, I've had a few good, a few bad, and some that were just plain weird. Of course, Christmas 2004 will always be memorable, cuz it was your first Christmas. But then there are these:
* That Christmas in 6th grade when I secretly unwrapped all the presents under the tree while my parents were away. Wow, what a disappointing Christmas morning. I kept waiting for them to drag in my "big present" from the garage, but there was no "big present" that year. Slippers, I remember slippers.
* That Christmas eve out on Little Venice Island. It must've been early on in high school, freshman year probably. I was out working in the yard and a deer walked up to me. Now, this is an *island*. A tiny tiny ISLAND. If there were deer on this island I would've known about it. So, essentially, a deer appears out of nowhere on Christmas eve, and she lets me pet her and feed her. Find out Christmas day that the inhabitant of a nearby island is missing his pet deer, named Rachel. I guess Rachel just decided to go for a swim and wound up on Little Venice. The neighbor came by looking for her and took her home in his little boat.
* Again, Little Venice Island. I have no idea which year this was. I have an idea that it may have been the Christmas that I will mention next, which may explain why I was all morose, sitting outside at dusk by myself. But I'm not sure. Anyway, I was sitting out on the point that juts out into the San Joaquin River, it was just starting to get dark, it was cold and rainy. A ship from some Eastern European country passes by, for some reason I think Russian, but I don't know if that's possible. Up at the very top of the ship, where the captain is, I see two lone figures silhouetted in the lit-up, glassed-in enclosure. I remember thinking, what a bummer to have to work on Christmas, in a foreign country no less. I stick up my hand and wave, knowing full well that they would not be able to see me in the fading light, and that they probably had better things to be looking at, like the river ahead. One of the figures, though, pulls his hand out of his parka and waves back. I don't know why I remember that all these years later. I wonder if he does. Another of those odd connections you make with a stranger you'll never see ever again.
* That one Christmas eve out on Little Venice, my dad's gone all day, I have no idea where he is. Later on in the day, my mom tells me to go look for him because he's got a phone call from one of his sisters. I get up to go outside, then I see him out the window, staggering down the walk, very very drunk. I guess I thought that Christmastime was a respite from all that; it seems it always had been in the past. I remember being mad at him all through Christmas the next day.
* That one Christmas out at Grindstone Joe's. Mom had moved to Texas to get away from Dad. I was away at college in San Jose. Dad and I had briefly discussed just forgetting about Christmas for that year. But I wound up leaving on Christmas eve and buying a tree on the way home. The guy at the lot practically gave me the tree for free. Someone shouted at me on the freeway, something like "nice tree, kinda late aren't ya." Dad wound up buying one of those Christmas dinner-in-a-box packages from the supermarket, you know, the tiny turkey, box stuffing and instant mashed potatoes. It actually wasn't that bad. Christmas without Mom was kinda weird, kinda sad, but somehow the thought of my dad alone on Christmas was much worse.
* Later on in college, my Mom and Dad were back together, living in Texas, I was still in San Jose. That was the first year that I decided that I would just stay there in San Jose for Christmas. My roommate was gone, so first thing Christmas morning, I "borrowed" her brand-new, super-expensive mountain bike and went biking out around Almaden Lake. Bikes actually aren't allowed out there, but hey, it was Christmas, there was no one around. At one point, down by the creek, there was a herd of deer hanging out on the trail. I jumped off the bike and pushed through them, pausing for a moment halfway thru, thinking how fucking cool is this. I'm surrounded by deer and nature on Christmas day.
Best Christmas present ever: A typewriter. It must've been 8th grade. One of those "big presents" that's not under the tree, your folks have to drag it out from the hall closet. I fancied myself quite the writer way back then, and managed to wring many epic tomes out of that thing before it bit the dust sometime late in high school.
Worst Christmas present ever: My folks gave me a "Salad Shooter" one year while I was in college. Wrapped, the box very closely resembled the Nikon FM-2 that I had been hinting about all year. I knew, knew, knew that I was getting a camera when they handed me that box. I deserve an Oscar for hiding my bitterest disappointment when I opened it. But I think I managed to sprinkle "bitter dissapointment" onto every salad that I subsequently shot out of that little fucking appliance.
It was somewhere around the time that I met your daddy that Christmas kinda lost its sheen for me. Hey, no expectations, you can't be let down, to paraphrase the Gin Blossoms. It's kind of a drag to know where you're going to be every Christmas, and with whom (daddy's parents house, with all his relatives). I know I'll never have another solo mountain biking adventure on Christmas morning, and somehow, the older I get, the more money seems to be involved with the whole season, and God knows, the older I get, the less money there seems to be just laying around. So Christmas over the past few years has become more of a chore for me than anything else. I'm trying desperately to turn that around so that I don't taint Christmas for you, dear heart.
I hope you have loads and loads of memorable (the good kind of memorable) Christmases that you will fondly reminisce about when you are the age that I am now. I'll try my best to make sure that this time of year is magical for you, baby. No drunkenness, no Salad Shooters.
Love you, sweetie!
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