A White December 24th

The sheet of frozen precipitation blanketing the ground has thrown my fiance, John, into such a good humor, it's almost sickening. He and I represent two different sides of the native Dallasite population's opinion of snow; he, the wide-eyed child, I, the shivering person standing in the doorway. If I hadn't seen it snow, hadn't had to walk to grocery store in a Dallas-style blizzard earlier, hadn't had to navigate the ice at the end of the apartment hallway, I may be warmer (haha) toward the snow's presence. If I had woken up to the sight of white, I might have enjoyed the weather today for about five minutes longer, before I decided to through a snowclump barehanded and received a return snowblob to the face. But, no, it's cold, John's ecstatic, and it might be the first white Christmas I can remember.

But what I actually came here to talk about is the draft--er, I mean, Christmas. I'm a little Jewish kid. Look at my profile picture; that's what we call a Jewfro. I grew up getting both Chanukah presents and Christmas presents (my mom's a convert, her side of the family is all pork-eaters), but Christmas was something that happened for a few hours during the evening of December 24th and for the five minutes on the morning of Christmas itself that I was still interested in the contents of my Mogen Dovid clad stocking. The tree was taken apart on Christmas Day, and by Boxing Day, it was all just a fond memory and leftovers of my Grandmommy's lasagna. As I got older, my mother got rid of my beautiful Christmas tree and replaced it with a Chanukah bush decorated in blue and silver ornaments, and finally there was nothing at all. My Grandmommy was in a car accident two years and nine days ago, bringing the mood down considerably that year; and last Christmas, I had the flu, meaning our dinner and present exchange was moved to January 3rd (which isn't even the same year as Christmas), and was relocated to Casa Navarro Mexican Restaurant down the street. This year, though...

I'm typing this post on John's mother's laptop. I have been invited to celebrate Christmas with actual Christians! Now what does this entail? Apparently, it's exactly like the TV commercials: wake up Christmas morning, whine ("When can we open presents?"), open presents, eat a big meal, leave.

I had questions.

"Do your parents go to church on Christmas?" "No, they go on Christmas Eve. I don't go with them, obviously."

"What do I need to wear?" "What do you mean?" "Do I need to dress up?" "No, what you've got on is fine." (Jeans and t-shirt, as always.)

"Will your Aunt Karen like me?" "Yeah, she likes everybody."

Thus fully assured--oh, wait, not--I redyed the streak of red in my hair and sat down to watch Iron Chef America as we waited for John's folks to pick us up.

And here I am.

I hope real Christmas doesn't involve human sacrifice.

Christmas? Nuclear power plant? Viking Funeral?