'Tis The Season

It's December - the time of year when the days are shorter and the nights, longer - at least in the Northern Hemisphere. It is also a time of celebrations, depending on one's faith or religion, as well as where one lives.

I've always loved this time of year: the sights and sounds - the spirit - of Christmas. And yet, there's a reflectiveness to the time of year; as the days get shorter, it's almost easier to have the darkness add a certain melancholy-ness, along with reflections.

This year, we'll most likely be having a quiet Christmas: good food, some small gifts, and having some family over. Thinking of this, I've been inundated with memories of years past...

I wrote about some of these memories in December, 2012. Those memories are wonderful, for the most part, though many times, the memories are easier than the reality of the time.

Example: I was trying to think of the worst Christmas we've had as a family. (Kind-of counter-intuitive, isn't it? Holidays are supposed to be wonderful.) But the worst one had to be the year we had to move. My landlord had lost a job and had to sell all three of his rentals to keep from losing them and the house he and his family lived in. I can't say I blame him for deciding to sell his rentals; I would have done the same.

After months of looking for a place - I won't go into the details - things really looked bad. We had to be out by the beginning of the new year, with little prospect of finding a place.

Christmas, that year, was stressful. We made it through, though, and on the day we had agreed to be out of the old house, I managed to find a place. We're still in the same house. But that Christmas, with its stress, stands out.

"At . it's not as bad as the Christmas we had to move," one of my sons has mentioned in subsequent years, when I've bemoaned being broke.

But, for the most part, Christmas is one of good memories. I have pictures of one Christmas in New York when I'd gotten a bike for Christmas. Somewhere, there's a picture of my sister and me in front of the fireplace in the same house; I think we were getting ready to drink hot cocoa.

There are Christmases in Connecticut that are memorable. One year, my brother, G., had wanted a guinea pig. I think his class had a couple of guinea pigs, and he wanted one in the worst way. Christmas morning, when he came downstairs, he spotted the cage with the cute furry animal and shrieked, "I got a pinny wig!" Of course, after that, the animal's name became Pinny Wig.

There was another Christmas in New York - Rochester, to be exact - before my parents split up. The next Christmas was in Florida; I still remember walking along the beach over looking the Gulf of Mexico as the sun set, that first Florida Christmas. Mom had been working at Red Lobster, and finances were tight. But it made for a peaceful end to the day.

Now Mom is gone. It's been a little more than a year since we lost her. Technically, it's the second Christmas without her. Dad has been gone for more than eight years. So many people gone...and yet, their memories live on, especially at Christmas tme.

Merry Christmas, everyone.

Holidays

It's only a few days until Christmas, and while my Christmas tree has been up for maybe two weeks, more or less, I finally got around to decorating it.

Before you ask "a competely bare Christmas tree?", it had three strands of lights on it since the afternoon I'd set it up. Just no actual decorations. It's not that we don't have them, I just haven't put them on our tree for a few years now.

There's a reason for this. (Besides sheer laziness; that doesn't quite cover it.) For years, we'd bought live trees from local tree lots, lugged it home, set it up, then decorated it with lights and decorations. Somewhere along the way, we ended up with two large buckets with lids to keep our Christmas stuff in; one bucket was for lights, the other for all other decorations. The light bucket always came off the utility room shelf first; once the lights were on the tree, the other bucket came down and the decorations put up.

Each year, it was the same thing: each decoration represented a family member who'd made the ornament or given it to us. My grandmother had given us quite a few ornaments: ceramic bells shaped like mice with little ceramic clappers that caused a tinkling sound when the mice moved, several clothespins painted to look like Santa Claus, and other trinkets that held memories of going to her house at Christmas time. My ex-mother-in-law had made a few beaded ornaments that we still have, though she's been gone for decades. There are ones that my kids made when they were in grade school. And of course there are others picked up here and there over the years.

Around the time P. and I had gotten together, my daughter M.H. and her husband moved out of state. One of the things they dropped off at our place was a 4-foot artificial tree. It fit nicely on a table top, which is part of why M.H. had bought it in the first place. It's easy enough to put together: simply pull it out of the box, put the lets on the base, pull the branches down, and viola!

However, P. and I simply kept buying real trees. Using the artificial tree felt, well, artificial.

Then, one year, we were a little short on cash. By the time we finally had the money to buy a tree, three weeks before the big day, there wasn't a real tree on any lot to be found without driving miles and miles. So, out came the 4-foot tree.

After setting it up, we threw several strands of blinky lights on it; that was plenty on a tree that size. Then, grabbing the ornament bucket, we found a few ornaments that fit the smaller tree very nicely. There was no way we could use all the decorations; there simply wasn't enough room. Sighing, I put the bucket back on the shelf, half the ornaments still inside.

This tree seemed perfectly fine for the next few years. Then P. died. When I went to set up the tree that year, the lights went on it, but I only had the energy or desire to put one or two ornaments on it. The next year, the ornament bucket didn't even come off the shelf.

A few years ago, I went out and bought a 6-footer. It's still artificial, but I figured I'd get a few years' use out of it. I even bought a few extra strands of lights, since two tiny strands of blinky lights just wouldn't do. But still very few, if any, ornaments. Until now.

My friend Kevin has been spending a lot of time here. He's more like a slightly strange, slightly goofy kid brother, and a friend. Nothing more, nothing less. Contrary to what Billy Crystal's character thought in the first half of When Harry Met Sally, men and women can be friends. He acknowledged the tree and several strands of lights. My son J. even put a strand of lights on that M.H. had given him last year; this strand has maybe a dozen large blood-shot-looking plastic eyes painted on the white globes.

"Cool lights," Kevin mentioned when he saw them.

But then, after a week or so with no other ornaments, he finally asked where they were. "You got the tree, you got the lights, you need to get some ornaments!"

I had to admit, it might be nice to get the bucket down. Last year, I'd used the excuse that our two cats, Karma Kitty and Drexie Calabash, might knock them off the tree and bat them around the house. But there had to be something I could put on the tree that wouldn't cause problems for the two crazy cats. This meant that the few beaded ornaments in the bucket would stay in the bucket, along with a couple of other potentially dangerous ones (dangerous to kitties, anyway). But then, there were other ones I could put on the tree: there's a plastic one that looks almost stained-glass-like and looks nice with a light showing through; there's a star made out of little mirrors (great for reflecting light), and several others that actually look a little nicer than I remember.

The tree is now officially decorated. It won't rival anything in any fancy home decorating magazine. But that's perfectly fine with me.

Merry Christmas, Happy Solstice, Happy (belated) Hanukkah, and Happy New Year.

I've gone to the cats...

When it comes to pets, most people - at least, here in the U.S. - are in one of two camps: dog people or cat people. Yes, there are people who love and own other animals: horses, birds, fish, lizards and snakes...But narrow it down to cats and dogs, animal lovers tend to take sides.

"I've always been a dog person," or "I'd much rather have cats than dogs; they're so much easier!"

I've always thought of myself as a dog person. Sure, we had both types of pets while I was a kid. But dogs were so much more appealing, especially the larger breeds. Irish setters? Love 'em, all that longish red fur and exuberance. German Shepherds? Smart dogs, good protection. But cats? Too independent.

What kind of pets do I have? Two cats, no dogs.

We had a dog when my kids were young, a beautiful, ditzy Cocker Spaniel named Osha. No, not pronounced like the acronym for the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, but like the kids' clothing company: Osha, B'Gosha!

Osha could play deaf when it suited her; accidently let her escape out the front door, and she'd wander around the yard, sniffing good smells, while I'd call her. "Osha! C'mere, Osha! Want a treat?" Nothing! But let a car door open, she was there right now!

When Osha was almost 6, my oldest son gave me a cat. He informed he he'd named her Soak (pronounced So-ack), which, he told me, was Kaos backwards. "But feel free to change her name," he said as he handed over the little black ball of fluff. I was leaning toward naming her Ybor, since Jason had picked her up in the Ybor City section of Tampa. Soak/Ybor cried pitifully.

It was maybe two weeks before Christmas, and our Christmas tree was up. That first night, I showed Ybor - Ebbes - where her water, food, and litter box were. Once I knew she was comfortable with these, I brought Osha into my room (didn't want any fights) and went to bed.

Five minutes later, there was a loud Crash! from the living room. Hurrying out, I discovered our 6-foot tree on its side, a very startled kitten clinging to the top limbs. I swear, she had a look that said, "I don't know how that happened! I was just climbing this big thing and wham!"

So I picked up Ebbs, righted the tree, straightened out a few ornaments, and headed back to bed. Five minutes later, the same scenario. By the third time it happened, I'd had enough. Cat out of tree, tree up, then cat, food, water and litter box into the bathroom with the door shut.

The tree remained upright the rest of the night. The new roll of toilet paper hanging from the wall, though, was somewhat worse for wear.

By 2006, a 16-year-old Osha died; a year later, E. B. (her name mutated from Ybor to Ebbes to E. B. White) died, too, of what was, I'm sure, a broken heart.

Several weeks before she died, my friend Kevin informed me that he knew someone whose cat had kittens. "One of them hasn't been claimed yet," he told me. "I told Billie that I'd bring the little guy to you when he's old enough."

"No way!" I didn't want any more animals. We'd already lost Osha and E. B.'s end was near. I didn't need any more animals.

"But he's your Karma!" Kev informed me.

"No!"

Kev gave me this look like I was some kind-of dense. "You're getting a cat," he said with an "and that's that!" tone of voice.

Several weeks later, after E. B. had already been cremated, I was on the phone with my son-in-law when I heard honking in my driveway. "Hold on," I told s.i.l. "This won't take long."

I opened the door and headed outside as Kevin was popping the trunk of his cab. "Hey, I got your cat here!" he called.

"Yeah, well, even you wouldn't put a cat in the trunk."

He gave me a look as he pulled out a litter box, cat litter, and a 4-pack of canned cat food. "Billie's got Karma. I just made sure I picked up the accutrements that go with a cat so you couldn't hand him back."

I glanced at Billie, who was riding shot-gun in the cab. She rolled down the window and held up another little black fluff-ball. Without thinking, I took Karma from her. He had the absolutely softess fur I'd ever felt. I rubbed my nose into his beautiful fur.

"Hey, Karma, how ya doing, little guy?"

Kev had already put the cat stuff on the front porch and was smiling as he passed me on his way to the cab. "See ya later."

I brought Karma inside and put him on the floor. He immediately started sniffing the rug, still ripe with E. B. smells. "Yes, Karma, this is a cat house," I said without thinking. Immediately, laughter came from the portable phone. I'd forgotten I was on the phone, and he'd heard the "cat house" remark!

I seriously considered changing Karma's name. My youngest suggested "Rupert-the-spastic-monkey-boy" after watching the rambunctious kitten tear through the house. Personally, I was leaning more toward naming the little guy "Kevin is so toast." Neither seemed like a suitable name, though. I mean, how can a person bring a tiny kitten to the vet's, only to have the vet tech inform the vet, "Ms. S. is here with Kevin Is So Toast." Nah...

We ended up with a second cat a month later to keep Kev - I mean, Karma - company. I named her Drexie Calabash, since my oldest son had 2 Drexies up in Tennessee. (It was either that or Kevin's idea of naming her Sutra; if I wasn't having my cat announced as Kevin Is So Toast, I definitely didn't want to show up with Karma and Sutra. Another idea was San Diego, since I was frequently asking, "Where in the house are Karm and..." My sons just rolled their eyes.)

We've had Karma and Drexie now for five years. They get along great, most of the time. They sleep with me...or I sleep with them, I'm not sure which. Their toys are strewn all over my (their) bed. I know if I were to pick up a couple of kitty beds, they'd probably look at the beds and wonder how I'd sleep in those tiny things.

As Kevin likes to point out, "There are three people living in that house, and two cats. Who runs the place?" to which I always respond, "The cats."