The Gifts

My sisters on a deserted street in Graton, CA. The only photo I took on Christmas Day. I like it.

The Big Day. The Happy Birthday Jesus Day. The day IT was all for: the running around, the flights, the lights, the wrapping and cards and calendars with windows. All of it.

I could write about the kids and their excitement and their gifts. Nothing to say there except it was all good - all joy and no tears. No disappointment, all fun and games...and new clothes.

I could write about the last Christmas George W. Bush will ever be president. Or what Jesus and God mean to me or how giving feels.

It seems curious to not write about how I felt and what I was thinking and how being in the cabin with those closest in blood line to me and how wonderful - together around the magical tree we chopped down less than 20 yards away.

Oddly I want to write about my material gifts. We (or I, rather with sibling consent) cancelled our Kris Kringle gifts this year. This would suggest that I get NO presents. A perfect way for me to play the "I'm all alone in this world" card which I seem to like to throw down from time to time. For some reason I knew I had no interest in that game.

But I did get gifts. I got three gifts: a pair of jeans, an historical fiction book about New York and a tea pot. Jeans, a tea pot and a book. I was not looking for them, I was not asking for them, I may not necessarily even need them, but I feel I felt understood, loved and perfect from them.

Giving me gifts can be a land mine of "you don't understand me" to "great another one of those" etc. Sad, but true. I wonder if I got a tie, a CD and a candle if I would have felt sadder, and more misunderstood. Or if everything had an otter theme or "How to Find a Job" theme. I wonder. Somehow I don't think so. My Grinchian heart may have gotten bigger without me even knowing it. Maybe it is not the gifts at all. Maybe I am just plain happier.

I like to think this is the case and I have everything to suggest that this is true.

But I do like my jeans, my book and my tea pot. I plan on using them all together.