I didn’t write yesterday because I was on the road from the far northwest corner of Missouri to Illinois to visit my family and celebrate Christmas. I’m in town now, typing this at Jeremiah Joe’s in Ottawa, IL, watching children misbehave next to the Christmas tree in the big display windows left over from when this space was Famous Department Store.
I’m getting old. I’m talking in that way older people talk: “I remember when this was Famous Department Store …” It’s inevitable that, when one gets old enough to see things change, that one documents the change aloud. I don’t like admitting I’m old; there’s still that part of me that thinks younger men should be conducting courtly displays of mischievous intellectualism toward me, but I’m officially past my expiration date for that.
The white Christmas this year will be only in our dreams, given that highs this week will be in the 40s and there’s no precipitation in the forecast. I might be able to take a Christmas hike at Starved Rock State Park. I wonder if that’s a thing.
It looks like my dev edit has been delayed till New Years (thank goodness; I wasn’t ready for a Christmas present that would make me cry!) No, I know all of what I’m getting for Christmas, unless the universe decides to surprise me with good news about my writing.
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Yule was yesterday, Hanukkah starts tonight, Christmas is Wednesday. Good greetings to all of you!
Tag: Happy Holidays
Watching Black Friday
So we went to Black Friday at two of the commerce centers of the Kansas City area — Oak Park Mall in Olathe, KS, and the Plaza in Kansas City. People were shopping pretty civilly; Christmas music was not nearly in the air as much as I expected. There were lots of people to watch; we bought some clothes and an obnoxious jingle bell necklace for myself. It flashes red and green as well.
Our mini-vacation is ending today; we’ll drive home and put up our Christmas decorations tomorrow. A lot of people I know put up their decorations pre-Thanksgiving because a well-publicized study said that people who put up their Christmas decorations earlier were happier. We decided that after Thanksgiving was early enough.
I didn’t come up with any new writing ideas over the break. I think I’m too tired to right now and should stick to my classes and grading till I get there.
Let me be the first to wish you a happy holiday, no matter what holiday you celebrate this season.
Thanksgiving on the Plaza
It’s (American) Thanksgiving morning and I am at a Starbucks on Country Club Plaza. Given the number of people here, I have to think that not everyone spends their holiday in the oft-touted multigenerational blowout meal followed by a gender-segregated tradition where men watch football and women do all the cleanup.
If I’d gone the childbearing route, I would likely be expected to host, as expressed in the song “Over the river and through the woods/to grandmother’s house we go”. The song also mentions a sleigh, a rather outmoded form of transportation involving a semi-sentient horse that knows the way. Trust me, if I were Grandma, we’d be going out to eat.
Richard and I are those kind of adults who live far away from their relatives and who will neither host nor journey to those traditional Thanksgiving feasts, so we go someplace nearby that’s determined to have Thanksgiving dinners for people like us. This year it’s Kansas City, where we’re staying in a bed and breakfast just off the Plaza and watching the Plaza lighting from the balcony. And watching people go crazy for Black Friday.
What am I thankful for? My quirky, unconventional life.
Merry Christmas!
Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!
If you are with a large or small family celebrating, I am thinking of you.
If you are celebrating with a friend or two because your family has rejected you, your family is too far away, or you have no family, I am thinking of you.
If you are spending time in a hospital, prison, or other institution, I am thinking of you.
If you have to work today, I am thinking of you.
If you are alone, by choice or chance, I am thinking of you.
If you are missing loved ones who have died, I am thinking of you.
If Christmas is difficult because of an abusive family, I am thinking of you.
If you feel hopeless today, I am thinking of you.
If you feel lonely, even around others, I am thinking of you.
If your Christmas doesn’t look like the Christmas in a Hallmark Christmas movie, I am thinking of you.
If your Christmas celebration includes traditions your neighbors would think are strange, I am thinking of you.
If you are of one of the groups who don’t celebrate Christmas, or observe it in a secular sense only, I am thinking of you.
All of our experiences of Christmas are equally valid, equally real, equally ours.
May you find what you really need this day, and all the days of your life.
Words Like Me 