Grandparents

My paternal grandparents are unfortunately deceased. My grandmother passed away in 2006. Christmas hasn't been the same without them. For me, Christmas is almost synonomous with them. For some reason, I miss them very much this year. I've been thinking about them a lot lately.

They lived around an hour outside of town, and rarely came to town to visit us. It was mostly us visiting them.
So you knew that when they did come to our place, it was a special occasion. It was almost something holy. Hearing their voices in our place was really something.
I had this annual Christmas Eve tradition growing up, I would take a long bath with either scented oils from the body shop or some funny bubble bath. I clearly remember this bottle of bubble bath in the shape of Fozzie Bear from the Muppet Show.
There'd be incredible excitement in the air, because it was Christmas Eve, the best day of the whole year.
I'd be in the bath, trying to casually read a book or comics, in an attempt to contain the feverish butterflies in my stomach.
All of a sudden, the front door opens and I could hear those familiar voices. They never used the door bell because that was simply not done in the village where they lived and certainly not when you were visiting family members.
Now that the grandparents had arrived it became impossible to stay in that bath one more minute. Although I would force myself to stay in the tub for just a few more minutes anyway, just so that I wouldn't appear too anxious.
Calmer, more restrained kids were the ones to receive more approval in our family.
I definitely didn't belong to this category.

My grandfather would be sitting on a chair next to the window in the kitchen, smoking a cigarette. This was before smoking inside and around children became a big no-no.
He would always talk about what traffic had been like on the roads.
My grandmother was more laid-back. She would sit at the table. Her short hair was curly, either from her last perm or from hair curlers.

Then we had coffee and cakes and cookies. Sometimes my father's aunt and her family would join us, in which case everything was even more thrilling. I loved it when we were all together. It meant it was a special occasion indeed. Just having the grandparents there was a big deal.

My grandpa would always tease me in the same way every Christmas Eve. At least three times he would ask me, in this very teasing voice, if I was nervous and excited about the Christmas gifts. He'd say my face was white with excitement. Which it most likely was, but of course I'd vehemently deny it and get angry about the mere suggestion of it. As I got a little older I developed a new strategy of answering calmly and casually instead of getting mad.

Then as I got older, he continued to tease me in the same way. It wasn't until I was in my mid-twenties that he stopped. Soon after he that he passed away. At the time, when I was a kid, his joking would annoy me, since I always tried so hard to appear nonchalant and cool about the presents. Now I miss it, oddly enough. I simply miss their presence.

It's just not the same without them. It's like something is still missing after all these years. This year I'm being very nostalgic.

Sometimes the numbness wear off

And I'm reminded that I really do feel like crap most of them time.

I should be more appreciative. I have do have it pretty good compared to a lot of other people.

So then why is it that I can't shake this?

I was feeling fine all day, even perky almost. Now suddenly I did a 180. Maybe it's simple fatigue. I've been really tired lately, all the time. I sleep around 8-9 hours a night but yet I'm still always tired. It's not that I sleep too much. It's a different kind of tired. Sometimes I get so tired of myself.

I think I best be off to bed.

On a mission to find the Christmas spirit

I'm on a quest to locate that Christmas spirit that seems to have gone missing in the last few years. I need to start creating new holiday traditions instead of relying on old ones. In order to help me along the way, there are a few things that are essential and that I simply cannot relinquish.

Number 1 tool in quest for Christmas spirit: Candles- And lots of them. There will be candles everywhere in this apartment. A room can look crappy, messy or bare, but when you light a few candles in it, it makes all the difference in the world.

Number 2 tool in quest for Christmas spirit: Baking - The joint will smell like a truck transporting cinnamon just collided with a vanilla truck, and the cargo busted open and mixed in the wind. An added plus will be bringing some to a friend's house on Christmas Eve. Yes, how homespun and nice is that!

Number 3 tool in quest for Christmas spirit: The Christmas tree - Which has yet to be purchased. This year we're going for an artificial tree. We've had real trees the previous years we've lived here but every single year it just makes me so sad I can't stand it. To chop down a tree, bring it into our house, decorate it and then suddenly throw it out so that it can lay there abandoned and await a slow death. No thanks! However, a Christmas tree is essential. No Christmas without it. While I decorate it I plan to have Christmas music playing in the background, which brings me to number 4...

Number 4 tool in quest for Christmas spirit: Christmas music - Particularly "Oh Holy Night", "Silent Night" and "The Christmas Song", the Nat King Cole version.

Number 5 tool in quest for Christmas spirit: The movie "Foul Play" and "The Tales of Beatrix Potter". I know that the former sounds like an odd choice of Christmas movie, but it's actually an ancient tradition of mine. Coincidentally, "Foul Play" was shown on T.V around December 21st a few years in a row when I was a kid. I watched it with the freshly decorated Christmas tree in the same room and the smell of my mom's hyacinths, which she always put out in the living room for Christmas. Now, this movie has become synonymous with childhood Christmases, and I make a point to watch it around December 21st, with hyacinths on the coffee table. As for "The Tales of Beatrix Potter", this ballet was on T.V every December 23rd when I grew up, and I always used to watch it. It would be on around 3:00pm, and it would be getting very dark outside. The coffee table would be filled wit nuts and clementies, and wonderfully smelling hyacinths of course. While my parents were either out Christmas shopping or my was cooking, I would be lost in the fantasy world of Beatrix Potter, all the while keeping a watchful eye on the presents that had by now appeared underneath the tree.

Number 6 tool in quest for Christmas spirit: Hyacinths!

More may be added as we get closer to Christmas, and I get more in touch with my Christmas muse. I think a definite theme here is childhood. Never do we enjoy Christmas the way we do when we're kids. It'll never be the same again but one can at least try and recapture some of it.

Showing legs for charity

When I was at one of the two teenie weenie malls here today, I saw these heavily made-up girls wearing nylon stockings and red sweaters, asking for donations to some charity. Actually whether or not they were asking for donations is debatable, since they seemed more engrossed in gossip than charity. No doubt for them this was more about dressing sexy and getting a lot attention than collecting money for charity. I can't blame them. In this town one has to grab whatever opportunity comes along.
Is it me, or does it seem inappropriate to dress up some girls like skanks and let them parade around the mall? Why do they have to dress like skanks? Will people donate more then? If that's the case, there's something terribly wrong here. Do people need to some and makeup before they give money to charity? Is that how evolved our society is?
I suppose so. Screw women's lib, right?

P.S. I hate this town sometimes. I truly do. I wish I could pack up my parents and my belongings and leave. I have a love/hate relationship with this place. I will always have my roots here and I love its nature and clean air but if it wasn't for my folks living here I would leave and not come back.

Is Christmas almost here again?

It's not as though it's snuck up on me. I knew it was coming. I was looking forward to it, as I always do. But now that it's actually almost here I don't feel it, as always. I feel even less this year. I suppose that's because as usual these days we don't have any plans for Christmas. It'll be the four of us again, well five counting Kelly. It all centers around Kelly since she's the closest thing to a child we have. We watch as she opens her presents, with a little assistence. I put a big red bow around her neck on Christmas Eve, so she can look all nice and christmassy. When we eat she gets a special Christmas plate too.
It's a bit sad, how things have changed over the years. Christmas should be different from all the other days of the year. It should be a big deal. It should be boisterous, yet peaceful. Small and intimate is nice, but not all the time. Sometimes you want big, loud family events.
I know circumstances have changed for our family. It's just the four of us now, and I've accepted that because that's how it is. Life is full changes. It can't all stay the same forever. It changes for us all of us.
This time of year it feels a bit empty though.
I've been watching "National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation", because it's a December tradition for me, and also because the movie centers around a big family Christmas, crazy though those family members may be.
I'm living vicariously through movies and T.V shows this Christmas. At least that's the plan.
When you think about it, it's a bit odd that we don't celebrate this event with our friends. I did one year. The one year I spent Christmas in Vancouver, Nick and I had some friends over. It was different from what I was used to, but nice. Peaceful. Peaceful is nice.
Often, we're closer to our friends than we are to our relatives, yet when it comes to the big holidays we spend them with our relatives.
We don't anymore. Hence the small gathering.
Anyway, Christmas isn't about large gatherings is it. Christmas is going to come whether or not you have a gathering of 20, or a gathering of 1. When I was a kid, there was nothing worse in my mind than spending Christmas Eve alone. I never felt so much pity as I did for those that spent Christmas on their own. I still think it's quite sad, even though some people actually choose to be alone.
Anyway, I will try to get more into it. I plan to bake and make the place smell wonderful and look really cozy the day before Christmas Eve.

Invisible?

Do you ever have times when you feel like you're the invisible woman/man? When you feel like you're talking to yourself? Sometimes I wonder why I even bother.

A lurking cold

It started with a somewhat scratchy feeling in my throat on Thursday evening, together with dry lips and some general discomfort. Then I couldn't sleep properly that night and felt very tired and a bit achy on Friday morning, so I called in sick.
Now it's been 24 hours and I'm still waiting for whatever this is to actually break out. I still feel like one does in that awful before-stage when you just realize that you're coming down with a cold and all you feel is a tickle in your throat and a some body aches. That's the worst. I'd much rather have the actual cold than linger in the before-stage, not sure whether it's a cold or my imagination. Having a cold is not that bad. In fact I've been hoping that I'd get one. Being sick in December is really cozy. You get to curl up on your bed/couch with the Christmas lights in the window and lay there and comfortably drift in and out of sleep as the sun sets behind snow-covered tree tops. And, this one has nothign to do with Christmas, you get to medicate yourself with painkillers that make you feel comfortably drowsy and at ease. There's something about waking up from a nap and realizing you have fever-induced chills, and getting up with a blanket wrapped about your shoulders and making yourself a big cup of tea with honey and downing some extra strength tylenon, then going back to bed with about 3 blankets to watch some T.V, and then within 15 minutes start to feel warm and secure, as if those pesky chills were never there. That transition between chills and warm and secure is very enjoyable. That warm feeling that suddenly comes creeping and starts to work its way through your body.
There are definite perks about having a cold. As long as it doesn't get too unpleasant, it's quiet nice. I think we all need it at least a couple of times a year. Two times a year to retreat from the world and the pressures and enter this snug, secure little world of blankets, honey, cough drops and old T.V shows. At the end of these bouts I usually feel so relaxed and at at ease. A bit reluctant and scared, yet ready to enter the real world again.
Anyway, at this time I feel like I'm still in the before-stage. That's how it's been lately whenever I get a cold, like it doesn't really break out. It's like a tickle in my throat and some fatigue and that's it. No fever. I wish it would just break out and be done with it. Am I sick or not?