Wrap stars and collard greens.

Well. Merry Christmas, y'all. Hope it's been a grand one for everyone. You can define "grand" however you want. Relatives talking way too close, high school kids looking bored and pleading under their breaths with throaty growls to be released from familial captivity, and grandparents taking an obscene amount of photos all count as parts of a grand ol' holiday. At least that's what I think.

So. Let's just roll real random, shall we? Don't mind if I do.

First, this:

My Small Group Delta med students sent me this sweet gift from Harry and David. I was super touched when I picked the box up from my porch. I received tons of well wishes from students current and former. And that was great. It was.

Yesterday the fun started with JoLai and Poopdeck coming in from L.A. and joining us at my house on Christmas eve. I just realized that the last three Christmases have included Grandpa and Auntie JoLai on Christmas eve. The kids now look for them which is kind of awesome. I'm super glad that they were able to come especially since last year Poopdeck insisted that he wasn't coming at all. This year there were no surprises--I knew my baby sis and Dad would be right here with us.

Yay.

Wrapping gifts this year was easier than it was in 2012. Most of you know that Deanna was the designated gift wrapper in our family. Her craftiness made her like an expert gunman with a roll of paper and some tape. The edges were always smooth and the tape hidden. And so. I never learned to wrap presents. Why when I had Deanna?

Man. Last year wrapping gifts involved a lot of tears. Not just for me but also for my sister-in-law Francoise. She's wrap star, too, but still. The whole process just reminded us all so much of Deanna. It was hard to do it without her.

My lumpy, fat wrapping paper was hilarious last year. And what made it even better was that JoLai was with me. We cackled at our crappily aligned edges and patchwork saves for too-small pieces of wrapping paper. Lawd. I couldn't wait to pour us some bubbly wine and do it all over again this year. I even made up my mind that we'd wrap the gifts as horribly as possible just to get a good laugh and to prove that we're a hot mess without Deanna to rescue our gifts.

Y'all! You won't believe what happened. I held up my end of the bargain, man. I had the prosecco and the silliness. I made sure to do not one thing to improve in my gift wrapping techniques to add to the experience. Yes. I did my part. But that JoLai. Guess what she did? She shows up acting all regular. And THEN wraps the first gift.

What the . . . ?

Then she does this.

 

Hold the phone, man. These edges were clean. Rulers were involved to smooth out bumps. Dude. This was a Deanna-level wrap job I was witnessing. 

"What the heck! What's with this legit wrapping?" 

"I decided to step my game up and learn how to wrap gifts like Deanna." 

"Say whaaaat?"

"Yup."

"So does this mean. . . you're the wrap star now? And that you're stepping in for Deanna?"

"Yep." 

My eyes widened. "Aww man. Well you know what that means. Ha ha ha ha." 

JoLai did know. She pointed to the couch where I happily leaped. Because when Deanna's legit wrapping operations were underway, I was relegated to labels and that's it. So up until that time I'd just curl up on the couch watching animated Christmas cartoons and sipping bubbly. 

Woo hoo!

And so. Gifts got wrapped perfectly and kids were delighted upon waking. It was all good.

Which reminds me. I am wondering how much longer the Santa dream will last. My explanations are gaining less and less steam.

Case in point:

Isaiah's Christmas list:  1.  WiiU game console. or Xbox One game console.

"You're not going to get either of those since you just got the Wii last year."

"Yes I can. If it's number one on my list I will get it from Santa Claus."

"That's not true. Santa checks with the parents to see if it's okay."

"What?"

"Yeah. Like what if a kid asks for a grand piano and they live in a studio apartment?"

"What's a studio apartment?"

"Something too small for a big ol' piano. So yeah. Santa checks with the parents to see if the gifts work in the homes. So like Moms and Dads tell Santa, 'Oh, we already have a new Wii. Don't bring another console here.'"

"Well I know a lot of kids who get another game console even though they have one already."

"That's because their moms didn't speak with the North Pole when they called."

"So you told him about the Wii?"

"Yes, sir."

Erases #1 on list and replaces it with something else. And less expensive.

5 points for Gryffyndor, dude.

Overheard today:

Zachary:  "Why are the gifts from Mom and Dad wrapped with the same paper as the ones from Santa?"

Isaiah:  "Oh that's because Santa is so busy that a lot of the presents they just leave at your house without even wrapping them. It's up to your Mom and Dad to to decide if they wanna wrap them."

Zachary:  "Oh! So the Santa gifts are getting wrapped with the Mommy and Daddy gifts?"

Isaiah:  "Yep."

Zachary:  "Okay. That makes sense."

*cough*

Maybe I did or did not say that to Isaiah last year when he asked me. Mmmm hmmm.

Anyways.

Dinner was at my brother's home and that was great. All the cousins. Laughter. Good food. All that.

Oh! And JoLai's new beau joined us. Yes! And he fit right in when Daddy and Harry started trashtalking about basketball. And he also seems really in to my sister in the best way which is really good.

Yep.

And before you think I'm a complete loser, just know that what I didn't do in wrapping I made up for in other areas. Like making collard greens and macaroni and cheese.

JoLai was happy to pay me back for my lounging the night before. She lounged around and acted silly during my collard picking expedition. And was in her second or third post-breakfast nap by the time I moved on to the mac and cheese. Mmmm hmmm.

Hey! We even had both kinds of cranberry sauce. Ha.

Ha. Writing that just made me think about the top ten post on how my people "do" Christmas. Ha ha ha. If you never read that one, check it out for a chuckle. That was when I learned that a lot of things that I attribute to black culture are just Southern things. But then again, a lot of things are uniquely bits of African-American traditions.

Mmm hmmm.  Read that one.

Yeah. So the day was good. Tounces and Poopdeck did well and had only a few fleeting sunshowers. We welcome those because it keeps Deanna as a forethought and never an afterthought.

It was a happy day. I hope yours was good, too.

 Merry Christmas to all. And to all a good night.

***

Peace on earth, good will toward all o'y'all.

And to all a good night.

He said he wasn't coming. Too much traveling in the last month and a half. First for the weekend after the new normal started. Then once more for the services. Coming back to Atlanta again for Christmas would be too much. Just too much.

"But you'll be alone," we said.

"I'm okay," he replied.

"But I just want you here for Christmas. Even if you'll be okay I still want you to be here with us." That's what I said to counter that. Poured it on thick and made it specific. Not just you need to be here. But we want you to be here. I want you to be here.

He wasn't budging.

"I'm tired. I'll be fine, I will."

And even though I didn't like it, that answer made sense. So instead of pushing further, I just turned it into this joke where I'd ask him every single day what time his Christmas flight was getting in. And he'd just laugh and say, "In February or March." So I just kept on with it, hoping eventually he'd be swayed. When I called him last night--at around seven thirty at night--I finally believed him. I was expecting his phone to go straight to voice mail and to see him sneaking up behind JoLai when Harry brought her back from the airport.

Nope. He answered the phone and told me matter-of-factly of the west coast things he was up to and would be up to this Christmas. Because that's where he was.

Allegedly.

The kids had hung out with Tounces all day and I'd just picked them up to bring them on home for Christmas eve. That's when I chatted with Dad on the phone and Harry, too, while heading up to Gwinnett county and back. Nothing about it was unusual. Except for the disappointment I felt about my dad actually going through with staying alone in California.

Yeah.

I walked into the door with the kids and the first thing I saw was a rolling carry on bag sitting at the door. I knew JoLai wasn't due for another two hours, so that was a bit confusing. I threw my keys onto the table and headed toward the kitchen. That's when I turned around and saw him. Sitting right on the corner of the couch smiling.

Gasp.

The BHE was in cahoots with him and had picked him up from the airport. They were even together during both of those earlier phonecalls, those scoundrels.

Man. I broke down and cried the minute I saw my daddy. I knelt right in front of him and laid my head on his lap and just wept and wept. I was so glad that he was here and that we would all be in one place together. Glad because this would be the first Christmas since the start of the new normal, but equally as glad just because it was Christmas period. 

No, we're not an extremely festive family. Surprisingly, there aren't any rules on who gets gifts for whom or how and when we do things. Our traditions involve things like playing Bananagrams and doing the gigantic holiday crossword puzzle in the newspaper. But now, more than ever, I am clinging to all of that. Embracing the most every day moments with those I love the most.

So yeah, my dad flew in and surprised us all. Even JoLai, who left him a lengthy to-do list in California. And we convened at Will's house and broke bread and spent time together. We all navigated the new normal the best we could, and it was better than expected since none of that had to be done over the phone.

Dad and JoLai slept over at our place on Christmas eve. The boys woke up to Santa's bounty and also the arms of us and their auntie and grandpa. Yep.

And look at this:

Aaah, this photo. I tell you it's everything I want for my sons and it embodies all of the reasons why I'm so glad that Poopdeck decided to come to town after all.

I can't stop looking at this image. It's so .  . . so . . . Norman Rockwell. . .don't you think? Look at how content they are. How safe and innocent. And look at their grandfather sitting there working his engineer's mind to assemble one of the many "assembly required" gifts found underneath all of that lumpy wrapping paper.

It looks so mundane, so serene, doesn't it? Zachary singing to himself while listening to music on his new headphones and hand-me-down iPod nano. Serious Isaiah with his grandpa's cerebral mind, studying his remote controlled toy and trying to determine if everything was in order before pulling the trigger.

Every bit of this made me happy. Every little tiny bit of it. Knowing the huge advantage in life that these seemingly forgettable moments afford children. Especially man-children.

But that's a whole separate blog post in itself.

Yeah, so Christmas morning was good. As always, the kids were thrilled and fortunately very grateful. We've committed ourselves to not going overboard so, just like last year, everything was unwrapped in less than twenty minutes.

So that was cool. And speaking of wrapping. . .

I spent some quality time with my little sister, JoLai. We sat up and wrapped gifts into the wee hours of the morning. And crappy wrapping became the goal, which made us both laugh out loud several times. The one above was the absolute best of the lot. Deanna would have stamped a big "REJECT" on those willy-nilly corners for sure. But at least it wasn't as fat and lumpy as the rest.

JoLai asked if Grandpa Isaiah would notice that Santa and Mommy used the same wrapping paper. I wagged my naive index finger because I had a solid answer for that concern.

"Clearly we leave all the gifts out that we bought and Santa's elves totally wrap everything. It's such a good deal and it saves mommies and daddies so much time."

To which she responded, "Clearly Isaiah will notice and ask you about it."

Hmmph. Challenge on.

Well. I should have listened to JoLai. Or at least had my act together like my sister-in-law Fran and had separate Santa and Mommy paper. Whoops. He never flat out asked me, but I definitely saw Isaiah's wheels turning this morning. I know he's only seven, but my guess is that the real Santa might soon be kicking rocks right along with mall Santa.

Yep. I think the gig might almost be up for the jolly dude. I've already been hit with several logistical questions in the last two years about the traveling arrangements. This year he even said, "Atlanta's kids alone would fill his entire sleigh with toys and stuff. It just seems. . . " And he just sort of stopped there.

Eek.

The least I could've done was separate the wrapping paper situation in a watered down attempt to keep hope alive. I'll keep y'all posted on all of that.

What else? Oh yeah. Jo and I went for a lovely walk-slash-run after breakfast. A cool three miles in honor of Deanna's lucky number--three. We laughed and talked and just enjoyed one another. JoLai is all about exercise, so we broke a sweat, too.

Something about that felt right. The air, the walking, the talking, the sweating. The all of it. JoLai even gave me this cool t-shirt which made that walk feel even right-er.

Yeah.

Harry got the swanky headphones he wanted. I got my camera, too. And those boys got plenty of cool things including the thing they wanted the most: A Wii console.

Ooo Wii.


So that's mostly it. And for those who've thought of us, prayed for us or simply wondered how it went today. . . first. . let me say thanks for that. Because there's lots to think of on Christmas and fitting us into all of it isn't something you have to do. I also want you to know -- all of you who are struggling with your own pain and loss over the holidays -- I am thinking of you, too. Of Nancy and Crystal and Joy and Davina and Bridget and Rachael and so, so, many more people. Because the heart has room for that, remember?

So Christmas with the new normal. How was it?  Mostly it was wonderful. We were together in solidarity, touching and agreeing on all of the joy, pain, sunshine and rain (literally) that came with this day. So mostly, it was good and rich and full of love.

It was.

There were a few sunshowers but mostly lots of hugs and meaningful exchanges between family members of all ages.

And all of it was good. Very, very good.


Thanks for asking, okay?

***
Merry Christmas to all. And to all a good night.

To the top of the porch! To the top of the wall!

'preciate y'all.

***
Merry Christmas.

'Twas the night before Christmas. . .

Papa and Auntie JoLai came all the way from California and have agreed to keep an eye out for the Polar Express.

Good times, man.

***
Happy Christmas Eve.

Oh Christmas Tree.

 

The Grady Hospital version of Charlie Brown's Christmas Tree.
(Thank you to my fellow Grady doctor Lesley M. for this most blogworthy iPhone shot!)

I am totally putting a big a-- red ornament on the that sucker the MINUTE I get to work tomorrow.

Ha.

Man, I love this place.

***
 Now playing on my mental iPod. . . . what y'all know about this?



Observations after watching this video:

1. Charlie Brown may have met criteria for either depression or at least dysthymia.
2. Snoopy is that dude.
3. Linus is an old man trapped in a seven year old's body.
4. Somebody should have called Department of Family and Child Services on PigPen's parents.
5. I just remembered that Franklin didn't integrate the Peanuts until the late 1960's. Dang.