Tis The Season.....

This time of year brings floods of memories for us all. I struggled with enjoying the holidays for many years after my grandmother's passing. I was nine, it was Christmas day and I didn't know that I could ever enjoy it again. To me Christmas day was a day that made my mom cry and that didn't seem to jolly to me. Mind you, she went overboard compensating for it and as I get older, I realize it was as much for her as us. She wanted to bring us happiness and laughter to fill herself with it. Makes sense now.

So, the older I get and the longer I live in my own home the more spirit I get. I am only allowed two trees in the house this year. Our artificial 6-foot tree isn't allowed on the back porch and I can only decorate with 1/4 the enthusiasm and sparkle that the Griswold's used. Those are my rules from Circle K and let me tell you how hard it is!! I have enough white lights, courtesy of my over indulging in them for our wedding, that my itty bitty house would show up on Google Earth. Santa wouldn't be able to deliver anywhere else as my roof would entice the reindeer to land there and there only.

With decorations come a few memories I can dust off and laugh at. No focusing on sad stuff that happened over 20 years ago, and don't think I am not still hurt from it. I have been blessed with my mother for more years than my own mother had hers. So, I just find a way to smile at things:)

Most of our Christmas morning pictures involve me with bed head and big glasses. Heck, one year my glasses matched my jammies and my hair was permed. Those are buried in a pile at home for no one to dredge up and view ever again.

Before we moved to our current house, we bought a live tree and lit it for the holiday. Then we took it to our new house, planted it and now it is HUGE! I hope to do something like that with my kids, but I am finding pine trees aren't deciduous to Oklahoma and the dear nosh on them. Maybe a different sort of tree will have to work?

Mom took Piper Young and I to see Home Alone, before we knew they would franchise it and force three or four more on us! Colty tagged along. I will never, ever forget how sad he got when the hot iron fell on the bad guys face and burnt him. We laughed so hard at him and that made the poor boy cry!! Evil is laughing at that, isn't it?

I had the greatest mom and aunts who stood out in the cold with me to watch the tree lighting in Indy, then hit up Circle Center mall..... the first or second day it was open! That was during the state football championship in 1996- my sophomore year of high school. Present day is 2010. I bought two things of Mac makeup then and there! Was spoiled to have gotten it and I JUST now got rid of it. Like this spring. I am pretty sure it was past the six months they urge people to keep their makeup! Whoops!

Then there are the things from older years, like eating leftovers from Keffer Christmas on paper plates while listening to Rodney Carrington's Morning Wood CD at the kitchen table as a family. We laughed until we cried and that is a memory. Insert "you might be a redneck" jokes here! Or the year I had to borrow mom's car to help Susie wrap gifts. We drank a bottle of wine, forgot to wrap gifts and went to be at 3 a.m. My family never called to see if I was okay or not. They went to bed without checking on me. My feelers got hurt:) Or the year my dear husband got me a coffee pot and I didn't drink coffee. Poor guy has taken ribbings for that ever since. (I now like coffee, BTW.) And one last one- the first Christmas I spent away from my family found me in southwest Oklahoma. I received a down coat from Santa. After getting ready to take part in a foreign Christmas with virtual strangers who were bound to stare at me, I put my new coat on as a shield. With it I was safe. But, with it on I was sweating since it was over 60 degrees that day. How do people live like that?!?!?!?!?!?

Tis the season to make yourself a toddy and skip down memory lane in the glow of your lights. Time to remember that we are a damn lucky bunch since we have roofs and blankets, too. Donate a warm coat, a toy, or time please?