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Christmas Eve
All things are inconstant except the faith in the soul, which changes all things and fills their inconstancy with light, but though I seem to be driven out of my country as a misbeliever I have found no man yet with a faith like mine.
-- James Joyce
Friday, December 24, 1999
One year ago: Christmas Eve
Jack got up early, showered, and hit the road. He had to drive down to Yakima to spend the weekend in intensive family therapy.
I was able to sleep until a more normal hour, then take the bus downtown for some last minute shopping. I was glad I went early! The stores were getting more and more crowded while I was out. I successfully bought gifts for my nephews at The Store of Knowledge. I did a bit more cruising around after that. I ended up in Ross, buying a new set of sheets -- for myself!
I went home to wrap packages. My sister M--- had mentioned that my nephew J---- had developed an interest in cartooning, so I thought about hitting the used bookstores. Instead I dug through my own shelves for an early Calvin and Hobbes book, the Peanuts Jubilee book from the mid seventies, and a Charles Addams collection. I didn't wrap these as gifts, but just took them along when I went over to her house in the late afternoon.
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We walked a few blocks to the local church. My nephew J--- was one of the wise men in the pageant that forms the first part of this family Christmas mass. The only slightly awkward part of this: the Phil Donahue-style interviews the priest did with the pageant players, asking them questions in character. I don't think the kids were prepared for this!
To be more accessible to the kids, the nativity play is narrated by older children. I think they write their own words, perhaps with the help of the liturical director. I miss the grace and power of the biblical prose.
Back at M----'s, we had our now-traditional supper of oyster stew, with grilled cheese sandwiches for the boys. Then I got to open my gift (a very funny dish brush, with fish floating in "water" in the brush head), and see my gifts opened. J--- got a Stomp video, and a "Best of" tape from MTV Unplugged, plus a cartooning art kit and a joke-a-day calendar. (His performing interests have revived recently, along with a desire to learn guitar.) B----- got two Eyewitness videos: Natural Disasters and Volcanoes, plus an opti-bead magnet making kit, and a "just for kids" sticky note calendar. (A quote from B---- a few years ago: "Is this knife sharper than the tooth of a Great White Shark?" and he's still interested in natural world comparisons like that.)
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I went home and spent a quiet evening, watching TV. Have you ever seen the Slipper and the Rose? What a bad movie! I slept through part of it. It's very stodgy and sluggish. Cinderella is bland! Richard Chamberlin looks good as the prince, at least. The prince doesn't find Cinderella with the slipper -- he throws it out the window in a fit of discouragement, then the dog finds it and brings it to her. She's dancing and singing in a field (like an old shampoo commercial) slipper in hand, when the prince's companion sees her and rides to fetch the prince. How undramatic! Then the king and chamberlin convince her to sacrifice herself (like in La Traviata!) because the prince needs to make a dynastic marriage for the good of the nation. This wedding is actually arranged, and it takes another intervention from the fairy godmother to stop the ceremony and fix everything. Yuck! The songs are all very bland and forgettable, too.
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