the pounding of your steps

With this coffee comes inspiration and a desire to write. I should put that statement into the form of a question for Alex. I don't know if it will work but I have to try. The page before me has been blank since I got off the phone with O. She called and woke me up just in time to watch the sun come up this morning.

The conversation was on par with most of our exchanges but there was one small point that stuck out in my head and sent me to this page to try and write this morning. With any luck my cup of blendy will jar these thoughts onto the screen.

We will spend my first christmas away from my family together. It's not as huge as it may sound, my family has been making feeble attempts at abolishing the holiday for a few years now. They made similar rumblings this year and whether they get together or not remains to be seen.

There are a few little things that I'll miss this year.
1) Dad drinking a lot and making an attempt at trying to get everyone over to the neighbor's house late on christmas eve
2) ...

Ok, maybe there's really only one endearing thing that I'm going to miss. As I try to enumerate my thoughts I begin to realize why I don't really like the holidays. The uncomfortable lunch / dinner with the old folks, trying to buy presents with money I don't have, trying to guess what people want to possess, focusing on the possessions as symbol of the strength of our relationships, drinking away the sadness of winter, realizing that winter never comes in los angeles, unanswered prayers for snow on the front lawn, driving home unfulfilled and dreading the next week, new year's eve, getting somewhere 'fun', paying for the 'fun', kissing a stranger out of tradition, kissing a friend uncomfortably, trying to get the date right on the first rent check of the year.

But there was something else I wanted to write about, Thanksgiving. I know I am going to miss cooking with mom and making certain that everything comes out just perfectly and right on time.

Sure I will miss that, but it isn't going away any time soon. In a few years we may have the chance to do all that again. I mean, we did it 26 years in a row, that has to be some kind of a record or something. How many families have all been together for both thanksgiving and christmas 26 years in a row. We're the 'family of the year', but we have to relinquish the title sometime.

So I will spend thanksgiving with people here and O will be here to give me a present on christmas morning. It will be a very good holiday indeed. I can't wait to take the subway to the airport on December 22nd and find her walking out of customs.

I turn the lock on my door and sometimes I can feel her standing behind me with her bags with airport baggage tickets hanging from the handles. Turning the lock, opening the door, and letting her back into my life.