Christmas Post

I am sitting in my cosy little house, listening to Christmas music through the Roku.  Things sure have changed since I was a kid...even since my kids were born in the last 18 years.

First of all, Roku?  It sounds like a character in Pokemon; something else that did not exist when I was a kid.  Since I fired up the desktop, I have heard Tony Bennett, The Beach Boys, Idina Menzel and George Michael and I have not had to load my cd player and set it on "shuffle" (remember how cool that was?!?).  All I had to do was pick a Christmas station through my TV.  

Christmases when I was a kid have all become a tinsel-covered blur in my memory.  I remember fat, crazy looking trees at my maternal grandparents house (in sharp contrast to the perfectly shaped fake tree in my other grandparents home), bowls of nuts that you had to crack yourself and bodies; lots and lots of sweaty kids and overheated adults.  The oven and stove going all day long makes for an unpleasantly humid living room, especially when packed with dozens of relatives.

And I totally loved it!

Christmas was a day of many big meals and many stops.  Godawfully (for my parents) early present opening and Santa gift discovering (Santa did not wrap his presents in my childhood home and he still doesn't in my adult home.  That Santa wrapped other kid's gifts started nagging at my already suspicious mind somewhere around the age of six), brunch at my aunt's, super-early dinner (that we were always late for) at my great-aunt's, then, finally stuffed and crabby (if you were a parent) and excited (if you were me), we arrived at my maternal grandparents house.  It's not that the rest of the day wasn't fun; it's just that their house was the MOST fun.  It's where all my cousins and my grandmother's seventeen desserts were waiting for us.  I'm not kidding when I say seventeen.  There were years that I counted and if there were less than ten, my grandmother would be fretting that we might run out.

Adding to the heat and the mayhem, my grandfather would be blinding us all with his movie camera.  Those movies would get broken out on Easter, Thanksgiving, or a later Christmas when the merriment had died down.  I have so many memories of lying on the floor with my chin propped on my hands, surrounded by nearly everyone I loved, laughing at those old movies.

So much stayed the same and so much changed as I got older.  My teen-aged self did not appreciate the Christmas Eve service that took me away from my (totally super-fun) boyfriend's family party.  I did NOT want to get up early to see what Santa brought for my younger sister and brother.  All I wanted was a leather jacket, to sleep late and some freedom.

So many pictures of me smirking or rolling my eyes during these years.

When I moved away at twenty, I was not quite prepared for spending holidays without my relatives.  That first Thanksgiving was pretty sad.  My (different) boyfriend's family was wonderful and welcoming but their traditions were so different from the ones I had grown up with.  I learned pretty quickly that if I wanted any kind of taste of home, I would have to learn how to make it myself and then, it would never, ever taste how I remembered it.  
That year, I did go home for Christmas, but things had already changed in my absence.  I had only been gone for six or seven months, but I had a new cousin, my room was no longer mine and it was clear that being an adult at Christmas was not as fun as being a kid.  By the time New Year's day 1991 came around, I was more than ready to get back to L.A.

Those years were some of the best of my life so far, but the time between Thanksgiving and New Years was always very trying.  My new boyfriend (now husband!  :) ) and our friends became each other's family.  We made the best of things, probably partied a little too much and complained about the lack of holiday spirit that seemed to permeate L.A.

Now, we have our own family and for many years, Christmas has been fun again.  There is nothing like seeing your little ones light up when they see what Santa has left.  It is warm and wonderful and maybe not as chaotic and busy as the holidays of my youth, but it is still wonderful because we are together.  We have our own traditions.  I have learned that the old cliche "Home is where the heart is" is true.  My heart is here with my family and it is also with my extended family and all the friends that made my holidays of the past memorable.  Being away from them has its moments of sadness, but more, it fills me with joy that I have so much to be thankful for and so many people to miss.  It is a luxury to have had them in my life.

Now, I have my own teenagers who roll their eyes and sleep too late and occasionally, make it harder to be filled with Christmas cheer; but they also surprise me with their generosity and warmth towards each other and us.  Santa's bounty is somehow anti-climactic at 11 am, but it is no less appreciated.  The pressure of staying up until 2 am and getting up before prying little eyes is off.  We make each other laugh and they are old enough to reminisce with us.  Things have changed again and I am embracing it; living in the moment, cherishing this time.

So, to my family and friends near and far:  Much love today.  I will be thinking of you while embracing my dear husband and big boys.  

Merry Christmas!

You Really Like Me!

My friend, over at Kimchi Latkes has been kind enough to send me a blogger award.  I really don't know what this means, other than she received some (well deserved) from other bloggers and decided to pass one on to me.  I might be happier about it if there was some kind of cash prize involved, but I am thrilled, nonetheless.  

As part of the award, you apparently have to answer a few questions about yourself that the nominating blogger poses.  Again, I really haven't got a clue about all this, but here are my answers to the questions posed by Kimchi:

1. If you could bring only three food items to a desert island, what would they be?  (Don’t worry about survival or nutrition here, I want to know what three things you’d be content eating over and over for the rest of your life.)

Having just written a post about eating more healthily, I think that being content and nutrition go hand in hand.  That said, my items are pretty healthy and I could be happy living on them, if not for the rest of my life, at least for a long weekend.  Anyway, I would pick pistachios, olives and bananas.

2. If you were attacked by a vampire and they offered to turn you into one, would you accept?  Explain.

Oh, the can of worms this question opens up!  I have mentioned vampires quite a bit in my writing.  I don't mean icky, totally boring Twilight type vampires, though.  I mean, super hot and sexy vampires; the way they are meant to be.  If one of these super hot and sexy vampires offered to bite me, I would not hesitate.  This probably would not be adultery, since I have a sneaking suspicion that my smoking hot husband is going to come out as a vampire any day now.

3. Time travel to any point in Earth’s history, and any location.  Where would you go, and why?

Good one.  I think I would like to go back to 1911 and see Machu Picchu when it was first seen by outsiders.  I've always wanted to go there and the idea of seeing such a magical place before most anyone else is pretty appealing.  Plus, Absinthe.  I would stock up.  

4. What is your favorite children’s book/fairy tale/folk tale?

I love anything to do with Santa Claus.  Who is cooler than a guy who flies around the world in one night in order to make kids happy?  No one, that's who.

5. Ocean or mountain vacation?

Can't I have both?  I spend lots of vacation time in the Adirondacks of New York and love that, but when I think about dream vacations, they usually include some kind of exotic, beach locale.  Think me and my husband on a lonely Greek island.  Ocean.

6. Describe the best thing that has ever happened to you.

I think the best thing that ever happened, was the thing that lead to all the other "best things" in my life.  It was meeting my husband while we worked together in Los Angeles in 1992.  All the best stuff came after.

Whew!  That was fun!  :)  

Meet the Neighbors

Today is the twentieth anniversary of the Northridge earthquake.  How twenty years have gone by is just crazy to me, but, somehow they have.

I was living in Hermosa Beach, California at the time, but spending most nights at my boyfriend (now, husband)'s house in L.A..  The night before the quake, we stayed up late, knowing we had the next day off.  We noticed the cat was acting funny, but didn't think much of it.  I mean, sometimes, cats do weird things.  Poor Poo Poo Meow was trying to warn us, but we just kept laughing at him as he tried to hide under things that were way too small for him.  

We got to bed at around 1:30 or so and were woken up by a jolt that turned into heavy shaking somewhere around 4:30.  I'm not sure at what point I realized it was an earthquake, but it definitely did not register immediately.  All I knew was that it felt like the world was ending.  I could see lights flashing through my closed eyelids (transformers) and I could hear screaming.  I realized hours later, since my throat was so sore I could barely speak, that the screaming had been coming from me.  

After what seemed like hours, but was less than a minute, everything stopped.  I could barely breathe because Danny had thrown himself on top of me when it started.  Once he let go, he immediately jumped up and went into Marine mode.  He searched for his flashlight (buried) and tried to get out the (stuck) door, slipping on cracked and fallen cd cases as he went.  In my terrified state, I wasn't about to let him leave my side, so I followed him, slipping and crashing behind.  

It took a few minutes of adrenaline based shoving to get the door open and when we tumbled into the hall, we began shouting for our roommates.  Everyone looked ghostly pale in the faint light.  

Once we realized everyone was okay, we headed outside to assess the damage and get away from the wreckage in the house.  We all kind of assembled on the front lawn, none of us wanting to move too far from the others.  We kind of stood there for a little while, talking about what had happened, wondering how many aftershocks there would be (many) and wondering how trashed the house was (kinda, but livable).  

At some point, I realized I was cold.  When I looked down at what I was wearing, it turned out to be Danny's flannel shirt, unbuttoned and inside out and a pair of underwear.  I remember thinking, huh, I should probably put some clothes on...maybe some shoes, too.  It was January after all, and even in L.A., these were not weather appropriate.  No matter that I was half naked, outside on the front lawn.  We all were.  The fact that no one cared or really even noticed was just proof of how scared we all were.

I did eventually fix the shirt and get some shorts.  I might have put on shoes, but, I'm not sure.

The first coherent phrase that escaped my lips, maybe ten minutes after it all happened was "It figures that we have an earthquake on our day off!  How many Mondays do we get off?!?!".  I wasn't even trying to be funny.  I was actually pissed.

After getting over the initial shock, we started to take in our surroundings.  The next door neighbors were huddled on their front lawn, as well.  All of a sudden, we hear our roommate say to one of them:  "Hey!  Weren't you in "Tales From the Crypt"?", as if he just walked into a party and was making small talk.  The guy kind of looked at us blankly for a few seconds and then said "uh, yeah".  We found out later that he had just moved to L.A. from New York the week before.  What a welcome!  He turned out to be a nice guy and a good friend and he's now semi-famous.  But, hey.  That is L.A. in a nutshell.

The twenty four hours afterwards have become somewhat of a blur to me now, but a few other things stand out; like not wanting to sit on the toilet (feeling a porcelain tremor go up your butt is not nearly as fun as it sounds) and not wanting to sleep alone.  We all (roommates + girlfriends and assorted others) tried to sleep in the living room that night.  Mostly, we talked and joked.  I still laugh thinking of one guy moaning in his sleep every time the ground shook.  I think he was the only one who actually fell asleep before light.  

So that's it; my earthquake story, twenty years later.