Christmas Past

Most of my Christmas memories blend together into a cluster of church pageants, unreasonably-large meals, and apple cider. There's always been a tree. There's always been music. There are gifts from family on Christmas Eve and from Santa on Christmas morning. No matter our age, it is the job of my sister and I to "find out what people want to drink" and to eventually serve the pie, which is stored not in the kitchen, but in a mysterious place in our house that has always been known to our immediate family as the Cold Sewing Room.

I remember sleeping downstairs in sleeping bags one year with my sister and our cousin Jody. We tried to stay up all night, an unsuccessful effort to catch Santa. We covered every doorway with wrapping paper and tape, certain we'd hear something in the middle of the night. When we woke up in the morning, the traps were securely in place, the gifts were under the tree, and our parents were calmly sipping coffee in the kitchen, undaunted by our paper barriers.

Another Christmas, the three of us put on our snow pants and boots and walked a mile through a snow-filled ditch to our grandma's house. Someone would have surely driven us, had we asked. Or, we could have simply walked on the road in far less time than the two hours it took in the ditch. But if we'd chosen either of those options, I'm sure I wouldn't remember that day.

In the late 90s, my sister claimed the unique experience of ruining Christmas three years in a row. One of these occasions was incited by my mother's addled plan for her 18 and 19-year old daughters to wear matching velvet dresses to church just as we did when we were 4 and 5. It didn't play well.

More recently when we were home for the holiday and in search of entertainment, my sister called a local movie theater to find out what was playing. After getting her answer and the showtime, she thanked the person on the other end of the phone and began to hang up. "So," the theater attendant interrupted, "are you for sure going to come then?" If we'd gone to the movie that night, they likely would have shown the movie to a theater of two. Because we didn't, I'm sure they locked up early.

It hasn't been a great year. Some bad memories have been added to the good. But as I near home, I first drive past an empty movie theater. My jeep then creeps carefully down the icy gravel road bordering the ditch we once hiked through, up to our waists in snow. I walk through the doorways once sealed tight with wrapping paper, past the framed picture of matching velvet dresses from our childhood. And for a little while, because everything seems okay, I find out what people want to drink and go to the Cold Sewing Room to get the pie.

Merry Christmas, everyone.

Objection. Relevance.

Unfortunate Lawyer: I was just at a hearing where the other side offered "God’s Holy Word as Defendant’s Exhibit C" and handed the judge a Bible. I objected that "God’s Holy Word" was irrelevant. Do you think I’ll go to hell for that?

Penelope: Maybe. But you know...it's also hearsay.

Go west of the Prime Meridian and take your first left.

These are my friends. I wish that you knew them.

Drew has the best-fitting jeans of anyone I know and would be the most likely to pull your tail if you were wearing a costume that required such a feature. He mysteriously disappears for weeks at a time, gives really good hugs, and mumbles on the telephone. Recently, he tailored something for me, put 60 pins in my dress, and didn't stick me once. When I tell him he should learn more about werewolves and the Swiss (their cheese and pocket knives), he tells me I should learn more about Hungary. And their hippos.

Travis is known to tell 20-minute stories that start with the words "Quick story for you...," veer off course to include, "...and then, my pediatrician's brother...," and end with "...well, that was longer than I anticipated, but I think you see my point." On any given day, he is the most stable thing in my life, and is the least likely to read and respond to personal email during work hours. If any of this makes you think Travis is stuffy, then you were not at the party in September when he put on a red wig and did ballet jumps in my living room. I am secretly in love with him.

Cathy is the pretty one. I have known her the longest and, when I met her 8 years ago, her hair was red, spiky, and 1-inch long. Now, she looks like this but still wears short dresses and hooker boots to her Quaker church on Easter Sunday. She always knows about some really great new band, and she sometimes gets sick to her stomach when she thinks about how much her Mercedes cost. I have a crush on her dad, Bob, who enjoys green Jell-O with pears in it. Her mom, Nancy, is very understanding about the crush. Cathy once drove to a different state in the middle of the night with $7 in her pocket to stop a boy from getting on an airplane, which is cooler than anything I have ever done.

Matt is very witty and mostly kind, but cusses at you if you say that you don't like waffles. He sometimes explains things in grand metaphors that start out normal but end with him saying things like "collective inertia" to explain something pretty simple. I trust him enough to loan him books and musical instruments and my best friend Brad, and he returns almost all of them to me un-broken. He reads to children and visits his parents often and has curly hair. He doesn't eat anything east of the Prime Meridian and, if asked to select a song for a compilation CD, will always choose 'Gimme Dat Nut' by Eazy E.

Button Me Up, Tie Me Down

The button popped off of my pants today. It's probably been a long time coming, this ultimate surrender...this abandoning of ship. It must have felt good. For the button, I mean.

I feel like this has been happening to several of my friends lately, which could mean a couple of different things: (a) we've been hibernating and easing into our winter coats woven from pumpkin pie and cheesy potatoes and dinner rolls and gravy; or (b) this sort of thing has been happening all along, but we're now just good enough friends that we can talk about it. (My friend Andrew's button launched off his pants with such force that it ricocheted off a door and Brad had to duck to escape it's path. Or so it was reported.)

Since I have no immediate plan of action to counteract the departure of this or any other button, I have instead compiled a list of people who could potentially witness such an event. And I have ranked them in order from #1 (the person whom I would least like to witness the exodus of the button) down to # 10 (the person whom, if this must happen, I would most like to see it).

1. My mother
2. Any boy that I formerly dated
3. Joshua Jackson
4. A doctor specializing in Type 2 diabetes
5. A waiter/waitress, while I am simultaneously ordering a piece of cake
6. Anyone who works out on a regular basis
7. My secretary (the nice one)
8. My dental hygienist *
9. Brad, Penelope, or my sister
10. Troy. I can't really explain it, but he would just...understand.

* This is who actually saw it happen. Clearly, the situation could have been worse.

Liquor Slicked Highway

Dear Client:

If you're wondering when the turning point was at our court hearing this morning, I would say it was right around the time that two deputies were called into the courtroom and the judge asked you to blow into a breathalyzer.

See you in 30 days.

All the best,
Unfortunate Lawyer

The Worst Conversation of My Life

Conversation with Starbucks barista:

Barista: How's your day going?

Penelope: It's going pretty good.

Barista: What are you up to today?

Penelope: I'm helping my mom. I'm grading labs for her.

Barista: Oh, my mom does that too. She... (voice trails off, but I think I hear the word "math.")

Penelope: Your mom teaches math?

Barista: No (looks at me like I'm completely batshit crazy).

Penelope: (Realizing that I would just need to start over): What I was trying to say it that my mom is a chemistry teacher, and I'm helping her grade labs for her classes.

Barista: Oh, my mom breeds labs. The dogs.