It's almost Christmas

- me when I was married (Christmas time)

So much of what Christmas is has to do with family.

When I was a kid my family had the typical gatherings at Christmas. We would visit my aunt, uncle, and cousins on Christmas eve, my grandparents would visit us Christmas morning, and the whole family would go to my grandparents' house Christmas day for dinner. Then my grandparents passed away and the cousins drifted away and my sister moved away.

I had two Christmases as a married person. The ex and I would drive to the Bay Area near San Francisco to visit the in-laws and extended family. So stressful ;) I wasn't the in-laws idea of the best possible daughter-in-law, I guess because I was six years older than the ex and worked at a nothing special job at a hospital. And I wasn't Japanese. When I was a little kid I had hoped to grow up to be like my grandmother, with a big family coming over on holidays to my home .... I had no idea I would only be married for a little over a year and would never for the rest of my life find anyone else I felt romantically about.

Eventually things looked up. I moved in with my mom, my sister moved back here, my four cats appeared. Then my mom got lung cancer and died, my cats got elderly and sick and died.

My Christmases now are spent with my sister and the new pile of cats. It's a good thing but I worry about what the future holds.

Oh, I must cheer up. Maybe some music will help ...



OK, better now :)