Wish List

On my lunch break today, I went to the mall with my coworker Bindi to find her husband an anniversary present. They are celebrating 10 years of marriage today. Of course, the mall was totally decked out for the holidays. I immediately became annoyed with all the Christmas cheer in the first store we entered.

I'm very bah-humbug this holiday season. I believe it is partly due to the fact that for most of my life, holidays weren't a big deal for my family. And partly (probably mostly) due to being a bitter, perpetually single woman.

After my Mom died, we kind of forgot about Christmas. She was the one who organized it all for the family, so I guess all the ballyhoo that came with the holidays died with her. My Dad had other things to focus his energy on instead of worrying about how big of a tree we would want.

In my high school years, we'd get our fill of Christmas at my Dad's girlfriend's place in Buffalo. They did all the usual tree/stockings/presents/food. After my Dad and his GF broke up, we just went back to ordering pizza for Christmas dinner. We did gifts, but didn't have a tree to put them under. So our coffee table became the tree. We'd just pile all the presents on the coffee table and open them Christmas morning.

Christmas only became a big deal for me when I was married, as I had a stepdaughter who was totally a believer in Santa and the miracle of Christmas. I did a lot of organizing to make sure that my new little one had a celebration at her grandparents' place, at my Dad's place with her new grandfather and uncles, and at home with me and her (idiot) father. I went totally crazy and bought her a ton of crap I'm sure she didn't need and that her mother would have a hard time finding a place keep all of it.

I even got us a tree! It was a little 3-footer because that's all that could fit in the apartment, but I got it and decorated it, and placed the presents around it. It was hilarious that the presents piled up higher than the little tree.

And then as quickly as Christmas had become important to me, it became non-existent again. My marriage didn't last long enough to have another Christmas with my stepdaughter.

So as Bindi was oohing and aahing over all the Christmas decorations, I was busy doing my best impersonation of a hissing venomous snake.

Bindi asked me what I wanted for Christmas. I told her absolutely nothing. She insisted I must want something. To which I replied, "A bottle of rum and a Kit Kat bar." Booze and chocolate make it all better.