On XMAS thoughts

Well, so Christmas. There was that brief moment where I felt a kindling of all that was warm and good in mankind- and then it got whomped by fatigue and noseblowing. Also I blame my relatives- sometimes the Christmas spirit is best embued by others, and occassionally by History Channel presentations on Christmas and perhaps a few-bestofmovies- Christmas Eve was you know, over to the small family and they all seemed to miss my brother- which you know fine. we all miss my brother- he's generally non-confrontational, charsmatic, pleasant, playful and talkative- when he's not being depressed and morose- but the former is what he usually shows to the family. so of course he's the favorite, loved, farandaway relative that they pine after. i don't mind not being the favorite. and i can even tell he was the favorite from way back through all the pictures, very telling i assure you. but i do mind when it starts to interfere with everyones enjoyment and then vicariously my own. i think next year i need a better attack strategy. something to get us out of the routine of it all. momside has been gathering over 30 years and the family has dwindled instead of grown. that'd depress anyone i guess. so there's this sort of half-hearted attempt to carry on with tradition. when really something else might be in order. i don't know what. and then the mutant dadside of the family which keeps growing and i refuse to participate- the whole christmas affair leaves me feeling rather disappointed- and trying to resituate myself on this sliding scale of christmas... bcs really it's a tradition- you want it to be about happy birthday jesus but it's not... and i don't know if it really should be. sometimes celebrations are just that... and according to the history channel kids were integral in bringing it back in vogue in the US... and if you don't have kids and aren't around them or somehow can't make a home... then there has to be something else. giving of yourself yes. but what if you woke up too late- and everything seemed to be over before you really "got it". waiting till next year just doesn't seem to be good enough.