about Christmas
Christmas was nice. we spent it at my sister’s house, as we’ve done the past year or two. most of it went as usual: the laborious one-by-one present opening, the small family fight, etc. that might make it sound bad, but i enjoyed it, of course, and i don’t like for things to change.
Maryalice got my Ma a DVD player. Zoya, my niece, is fast becoming a teenager and is now duly interested in clothes. Devon, my five year-old nephew, had an action figure-oriented Christmas and got a voice-controlled robot. in contrast to his sister, he was very unhappy to get clothes, but soon learned how to rattle off the fake “thank you” for gifts he hadn’t really wanted.
i had thought my Christmas was kind of small, but that was before i got four additional presents that had been “forgotten,” including the main thing I asked for: an office chair. i also got a gym bag, a Bears T-shirt, some beer, basketball shoes (which I have yet to pick out), an electric toothbrush, a teapot, a coupla CDs, a coupla sweatshirts, and various food items. blah blah blah, i hate sounding materialistic. of course, who doesn’t like getting presents?
i do wish Christmas were really a celebration of Christ’s birth, but it’s not — even for me. i guess i wasn’t really brought up with that as the focus, so it’s going to take some effort to instill that meaning in the day. on the positive side, i probably get more enjoyment these days from watching others open presents (especially the ones i got for them :) than opening my own. so maybe i’m figuring out some of it.