Christmas snippets

~ I am still not over clicking through the channels last week and pausing long enough to watch Olivia Newton-John in a gorgeous slinky gold gown singing Xanadu for “Christmas at Ford’s Theatre.” Everyone else was singing, oh, Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas or Silent Night or Feliz Navidad, but Olivia Newton-John came out and just nailed that perennial holiday classic, Xanadu. I was beside myself with joy.

~ Driving up the coast to my sister’s, I could not get over the huge char areas from the recent fires. For Thanksgiving, we drove up north to the deep dark middle of nowhere and saw miles of it. And that was a different freeway. This was the good ol’ I-5. The freeway that runs from the Mexican border to the Canadian border. At one point, around Camp Pendleton, the scorched areas came literally to the edge of the freeway. And the freeway at this point is probably about 300 yards from the ocean. So … immediately to my right — vast grey-black hills. Immediately to my left, vast dark blue ocean. It was surreal.

~ When we arrived, Piper was sitting at the edge of the driveway waiting for us. She’d just been sitting there. Waiting. For a while.

~ She was “so escited.”

~ She told me all about her “letter from Santa!” “Tee Tee, he tole me he knows I’m good!!” That seemed to be the most important thing to her. Well, that, and the fact that her drawing was apparently hanging front and center in his workshop. She then dragged me up to her lavendar-and-yellow bedroom and proudly showed me “THE ACTUAL LETTER!!” stuck to her bulletin board. I oohed and aahed and laughed the entire time.

~ Baby Banshee (new niece), now three weeks old, showed up a few moments later. Not by herself, of course. I mean, her legs are probably too short to reach the pedals. And I don’t think her arms can reach the steering wheel. And she can’t hold up her head unassisted. Or focus on things more than 18 inches away or something like that. I’m no lawyer or anything, but the weight of the evidence seems to suggest that she did not drive herself up to my sister’s house. Plus, my brother and his wife were also there with their long arms and long legs and working eyeballs, so I think we can safely conclude that one of them was the driver. Although, The Banshee was there, too. She’s precocious and kinda scary. In all fairness, we really can’t rule her out as the driver in this scenario.

~ This was the first time I had seen Baby Banshee and it’s always hard for me to see a new family baby at first, no matter how much I may end up completely in love with them. I always have to psych myself up. Ignore the pit in my stomach. Pretend no one’s watching my reaction. Pray I don’t cry. Act as normal as possible which is nearly impossible to do when you’re just “acting” normal. Baby Banshee slept a long time off in a corner in her carseat thingy so I kept walking by when no one was around, getting closer each time, just kinda circling her. She’s smushy and delicate with lots of dark hair poking out of her head. I don’t know where she ever got hair that dark. Later, when she woke up, I asked, heart pounding, if I could hold her. As she relaxed into my arms, I relaxed a bit and said, “Hey, little munchkin” while she stared up at me for a long time with her blue-black eyes. So I had done it. And I was okay. I didn’t start blubbing or shaking or breaking out in hives. I suppose it sounds strange, but it’s always a small internal victory when I do this. I have to fight my baser resentful self who doesn’t want to hold the baby, who wants to stay safe under the familiar warm blanket of bitterness. But beyond all that, far above all that, a new baby deserves to be greeted with as much love as her aunt can muster. And looking down into her smushed little face, it wasn’t that hard, really.

~ Upon arrival, Big Banshee stood in the doorway singing, “We Wish You a Merry Christmas” in her red velvet dress. (She is always ready for her close-up, Mr. DeMille.) She then immediately grabbed Piper’s hand and enforced cousin play time commenced. Later, there was an incident where Big Banshee hit Piper with a doll. This was NOT okay with Tee Tee. Even later, there was an incident where Big Banshee was freaking out about the bows on her dress being crooked. Her Nana (my mother) said, “Banshee, if you keep acting like that, you will never have any friends.” This was also not okay with Tee Tee. Sigh …..

~ My dad pulled me aside so he could perform one of his comedy routines for me. Let me explain. My dad has been in his church choir for ages now. He — according to him — is the resident comedian, the comic relief. Dad is a financial planner but once told me, years ago, that he’d always wanted to be a stand-up comedian. It was so touching to me. What he said. That he told me. Dad doesn’t share stuff. He just doesn’t mostly, so that was a big deal. For some reason, I’m the child he turns to when he wants to do his comedy. He always tells me the context first, “This is the routine I did at the choir retreat.” Or “I did this one at the choir banquet” or something. The routine is always typed out on paper. He doesn’t perform it that way for his peeps, but he types it so he can give me a copy. Still, for me, he starts to read it — with great feeling — and then immediately dissolves into great shaking laughter. He can never get through it straight when he performs it for me. I know he can for the choir because I’ve seen plenty of videotapes, believe me, and he never breaks. But for me, he’s gone. And then I’m gone. And then we are both just out of our minds laughing. Not laughing, even. Giggling. Like little kids. Uncontrollably. Honestly — and God help me — it’s not that I find his routines so funny; it’s that he cracks himself up. It’s totally irresistible to me. I’m just helpless against my dad’s great shaking laughter at himself. It’s adorable. I’m laughing right now just picturing it. That’s the little kid in my dad — my 71-year-old dad — that I just love love LOVE to see.

(more snippets to come — I’m just gonna post this part now!)