The Holidays

CHRISTMAS EVE

In the Smith house Christmas Eve is a night of solemn and reverent observance, a time for reflection, and most of all, a chance to make a lot of money in a hurry. Like Easter morning, it's a time when the big downtown churches are willing to pay through the nose to have a trumpet player participate in their service and enhance the worship experience by playing descants on hymns and repeatedly shouting out bad words. (More on that later.) This year I played three Christmas Eve services, a 5:00 service at a Catholic church downtown, the 8:00 service at my church in Gates, and then back to the Catholic church for midnight mass. Midnight mass doesn't start at midnight--it starts at 11:00 PM, and lasts for 25 hours until midnight of the next day. At least, that's what it feels like when you're actually in the service and waiting to drive home in the snow and go to bed.

All three services went well, except for the questionable language part. At the 5:00 service I sat down in the choir nook--this probably has a proper name like Chancellary or Vestibulillum, but I don't know it--and waited patiently through the prelude. When it was time for the processional, the priest asked the congregation to stand and to sing "O Come All Ye Faithful," number 481. I was already standing up as he asked this, holding my trumpet in my left hand and pulling up on the top of my music stand with my right. I gave it a jerk, and all of a sudden the entire top of the stand, music still perched, went flying up in the air. I managed to catch it in my right hand, but not before yelling (much more loudly than I expected to) "Oh CRAP!" Emitting a bad word in near silence helps you to appreciate the acoustic engineering of those classic Catholic cathedrals. The CRAP reverberated throughout the Chancellary, the loft, the ornate stained-glass windows, and round the sculpted heads of Mary, Joseph, and baby Jesus in the life-sized nativity. The three kings did not look impressed.

"Crap" was one of those words that we were definitely not allowed to say when the older batch of Smith children were growing up. Also forbidden were "sucks," "shut-up," and "oh my gosh." The rules have definitely loosened over time. It wouldn't be surprising at all to hear my parents respond to a tale from Martha's school day with "Well crap...that sucks." I try not to slip up too often around James with those sorts of borderline words. (This is hard when you "cheer" for the Buffalo Bills.)

Anyhow, the rest of the service went pretty well. I drove back to Gates, and managed not to curse at any point during the service. This was not easy, because I definitely made a "behind" of myself during the prelude. Our organist can be a little flighty, and he started the prelude for the service in the wrong spot. (Variations in service order are very offensive to Presbyterians, most of whom have followed the exact same Christmas Eve ritual since 288 B.C. The actual birth of the Christ child, being a break with tradition, was frowned upon in committee meetings of that particular year.) Knowing that I would have to be the fearless leader and cue in the choir for their Introit out of the regular order of the service, I stood up to ask the choir to stand...just as the bell choir was starting their prelude number. (Fortunately I covered my misstep rather seamlessly by sitting down immediately, pretending that I was smoothing out my robes, and turning bright red.)

I had enough time after the 8:00 service to drive home and see J's progress with the gift-wrapping, and then went in for the final Catholic service in a steady Christmas Eve snow. I sat patiently through the prelude, noted with some pleasure that a former professor of mine was serving as the priest, and stood up with the congregation to sing the processional hymn, "O Come All Ye Faithful." I pulled up on my stand.

"Oh CRAP!"

CHRISTMAS DAY

James isn't yet old enough to wake us up with Christmas Day excitement, but he did get up earlier than either J or I had intended on Christmas morning. She brought him into bed with us and we had a drowsy family snuggle in bed until 7:30, when we went downstairs to open presents under our Christmas shrub. We bought the shrub when we lived in North Carolina, and waited to set it up until James had gone to bed on Christmas Eve. (With good reason...the first 10 seconds he was left near it unattended he seized and broke an ornament.) There was fresh snow on the ground, and the shrub had never looked more festive. James helped unpack his stocking, and then J and I opened ours. (I'll be saving a full account of our Christmas loot for a later post, hopefully with pictures and braggy comments.) After we'd had some french toast for breakfast I brushed off the truck and we made ready to go to Christmas Part II at my parent's house.

Everyone passed out presents, we had plenty of coffee and pastry snacks, and there was much merriment in the Smith living room. James was not particularly interested in opening presents after his first or second turn, so J and I alternated chasing him around the house while everyone passed around the piles of gifts. I think my family is particularly talented at gift giving. There were just the right number of presents per person, and they were all very thoughtful. (As I said, the official list will follow later.) After most everything had been opened we recorded all 10 children/spouses and 2 grandchildren singing the Twelve Days of Christmas, and made ready for the Christmas feast. Somewhere along the way I kicked over my coffee cup, and walked around for most of the morning with only one sock on, while the other one dried. We also discovered a walnut ornament hanging on the tree that someone had stowed a message inside of through a small crack at the base. We made vain efforts to retrieve it without breaking the shell, but finally gave in, and found a little slip of paper that said: To the Dark Lord, I have removed the real horcrux, and I intend to destroy it as soon as I can. R.A.B. The kids all laughted uproariously, and Mom and Dad didn't have any idea why.

James went down for a nap (with J helping) after our enormous lunch, and I went to Christmas part III (the Grandparent Smiths) with an envoy. We wished our safe travels to the soon migrating Grandparent Smiths, caught up with some cousins, and nibbled on the remains of their Christmas Feast. A Very Uncles Christmas was distributed, and more loot was gotten, some of which hasn't been opened yet. (More on that later.)

We were back in Albion for Christmas part IV (Dudley Christmas in the barn) by supper time, and there were innumerable aromas there teasing our already overburdened bellies. The three feet closest to the barn floor at Dudley Christmas is an area scientists call the "toddlershphere." There are at least 20 small Dudley great-grandchildren, and I think several more might have been born and started to run about while we were there for Christmas. They all shout very loudly and want to run in circles clutching their new toys. Most of them are from farming stock, so between their clothes and their toys the barn looks like what you might expect the corporate day-care to be at the John Deere company. We left with a year's supply of free homemade jam and even avoided last year's tragic upending of the cold fruit-cup into J's lap. (Hayden sat with her own parents this year.)

We were on our way out. James was fried. We were both weary and over-full. We had been everywhere, we had seen everyone. We had been up way to late the night before. My Dad showed us a radar image of the storm that was coming in the next day, and we both got the same crazy idea. We debated it the entire drive back to Spencerport, and J (obviously) won. We would, after playing 4 Christmas Eve services between the two of us, then attending 4 different Christmases, drive to Pennsylvania that night with an overtired 13 month old in the back seat. Brilliant.

Actually, James did great. We turned around at our house in less than 20 minutes (though, of course, we forgot a lot of stuff) and he fell asleep almost immediately. I recaffinated and J, for whom I had brought 1000 Greek flashcards, for the purpose of keeping me awake and alert throughout the course of the drive, came up with lots of interesting discussion questions. (We didn't have to use a single flashcard!) We made the trip with no traffic, no red lights, and no pit stops. It took us 5 hours and 10 minutes.

And that was our Christmas

ST. STEPHEN'S DAY

Obviously, we slept in. We had Davis Christmas (loot list to follow) once we got up, and spent most of the day in pajamas. (Well, J was in pajamas...we forgot to bring two sets in the haste of our quick turnaround.) James loves the wide open spaces at Grandma and Grandpa Davis's house. He spent most of the day doing laps through the kitchen, dining, and living rooms while holding two plastic red spoons and shouting. (He likes to hear his echo.) He also found his favorite houseplant (the one he's not allowed to dig in) and a new houseplant that Mom and Dad said nothing about. (He dug out about a pound of dirt onto himself and the dining room floor before we found him.) Special honor was given to Steven Bear, since it was his feast day.

ST. JOHN'S DAY

We slept in again. James dug in his favorite plant again, and then ran in terror when we pulled out the vaccuum to clean up his mess. In a stroke of brilliant parenting, Grandpa Davis left the vaccuum parked in front of the plant. James hasn't been near it since. We also went down to the Great-Grand Weitzels with Uncle Dan and Aunt Emily to consume copious amounts of red meat, and (in J's case) shrimp. We went to bed at 8:30.