Memories, Christmas memories -

I'm listening to an old LP of Christmas music - instrumentals - that my mother used to play all the time when we were little. The sound is so rich, and the popping and static reminds me of those holidays in the 1960s and 1970s when the snow was heavy, and thick, the colored christmas lights shone out from their nests of white, and it was toasty warm inside.

My mother and her sisters always put their all into the holidays - decorating, baking, selecting presents and wrapping them - now that I'm that age, I wonder how they did it all. They created a magical, special environment that gave meaning to the idea of Santa Claus and the human interaction that this time is supposed to bring us.

I have to fight to keep the house clean, and if it weren't for the internet, no one would get a present of any kind.

Sometimes, I think that we just lose the ability to experience that magic again, because of our age, and the pressing responsibilities that we have as adults.

But, four years ago, my sister and her girlfriend were able to re-create that magic when I spent Christmas at their home in Albany - so I know that it's possible.

This was one of the first holiday seasons where I didn't have huge emotional upheaval related to my family. For eleven years; from 1988 to 1991, I was PNG with most of my family. Before my mother went into a home, she and my sister were planning family events for Thanksgiving where I was excluded. My father would beg me to attend Christmas, and a few hours later his wife would call and say that they had no place to put me, they didn't have enough places at the table, they were going to one of his sister's homes and I knew that I wasn't going to be able to go there.

So, every holiday was a struggle from about October until today. I didn't spend Christmas with my family for years. Today, and earlier in the season, I was noticing that there was this huge absence of emotional stress around the holidays. It's just a big irritation in the middle of the work effort around the end of the year.

Tomorrow morning, most of the rest of the world and I go back to work.

My sister gave me a book that looks to be a HOOT - a novel about the life of the wicked witch of the west! She also gave me a switchplate cover that's pink with stars on it and says "Princess" - which will go on the wall next to the bedroom closet door tonight later. A new Star Trek key chain .. all amusing stuff.

I'm now listening to the Messiah. The sound of LPs is so rich, compared to CDs and other digitized forms.

Another Christmas past.

Back to reality.

The Ghosts of Christmas past ...

Merry Christmas from the Central Time Zone. It's been here about 20 minutes so far.

I just finished watching "All Over the Guy." Yes, again. I don't know why I so love that movie. I'll probably watch it again tomorrow at Kurtis and David's house.

Just before I left the office today, I stumbled across a picture on one of my favorite websites - airliner's net - I'll show it to you in a second. The first day I found airliners.net, I was up until 3:30 in the morning surfing through the thousands upon thousands of aircraft pictures.

Yes, I'm an airline geek. No, they haven't invented a 12 step group for that yet.

Anyway, this picture is of my favorite airplane (777) owned by my favorite airline (Continental) coming in to land in Houston/IAH on a gloomy fall day. This is about as Christmas-y as it gets here in the sub-tropics, but this shot captures everything I love about this town, that airline and airplanes in general in one dramatic, gorgeous shot.

http://www.airliners.net/open.file?id=289493

Have I ever mentioned that my sister is just amazing? I emailed her on Thursday to tell her that I wasn't coming to Florida for Christmas, and she STILL got all of my presents to me yesterday even though she left Friday morning for Tampa. How did she do it?

Anyhow, I have some ghosts to purge about Christmas with my family, but it's late and I'm going to bed. The problem with taking part of a day off is that you have a chance to take a big nap, and then when it's past bedtime, you're not tired!

I'll conjure up some verbiage, and write more when I get up.

My entire blog - gone. Because of me trying to look at a webpage, which nuked me.

So, time to recreate.

Today, I was a productive boy. I pulled out about 1/4 of the hardcover books and re-arranged them, threw out a whole bag of old paper and crap, then, pulled the paperbacks out (which resided in a cabinet, all helter-skelter and impossible to sort through) and moved them. THEN, I pulled all the VHS out - I have TWICE as many as I thought, and I sorted them. Now, I have three stashes, each alphabetized - I need to have it down to TWO, but I need better storage for that to happen. Once done with that, I went through ALL the casette tapes, and tossed about 40, pulled out about 20 to sell on eBay (yes, more eBaying - I'm close to having a rating of 200.) All that remains now is to move more pictures around, have some things framed and hang THEM up, decide on paint colors in the living room and dining room .. figure out if I can put down wood floors .. re-hang a bunch of stuff in the laundry room .. go through the boxes in the bedroom closet, heave out another big batch of stuff and organize the stuff that remains into well-labeled boxes.

THEN ..

I won't have much left to do around here.

Except keep it all clean.

Tomorrow night, my buddy Curtis is coming over to have me look at some lease to own paperwork he just took out on a house in Magnolia (go to the end of the earth, turn left - watch for the drop off) - he started talking about home improvements, and all of the stuff that he planned on doing - and I [of course] asked whether he did that sort of work on the side.

And he does.

So, although he doesn't know it yet - he'll be looking at the damaged walls, where the speaker wire needs to be run, etc., etc.

I'm listening to a CD remix of dance songs from 1998 - that's when my friend Jeffrey and I used to be disco queens - I have SUCH a kick-ass stereo - it's not even breathing hard (my stereo is kicking out the tunes, and is pretty much filing its nails at the moment) - I have two speakers that I want hung in the den here so that I can play DJ while I play on the computer. I will have him do that too.

I hadn't talked to my sweet Owen ALL weekend until just about a half hour ago. He just got home from work (4 a.m. for him) and he's been talking to me. He's a hoot. And, he makes me feel good.

Nothing profound today - just been a busy boy. Have a WHOLE lot of work to get done this week at the office - so - have to get some sleep tonight!