Another Christmas Out Of Many
Liz Shannon Miller (circa 1997)
I found this picture of me and my cousins (taken about seven or eight years ago at Christmas), which seems to represent to me family gatherings up in Sacramento. For, no matter how times might change, how much older we grow or how different our paths become, somehow we all manage to end up in Aunt Char’s dining room on Christmas Day eating dinner. Knowing my family, this will probably always be true, at least until that house with its dining room is sold. And even then, all the Swensens will do is relocate.
My mom has three sisters, and so our family on her side is rather large. When only three out of four girls show up to congregate around Grandma (who also lives in Sacramento), it still is quite a load. Grandma lives in a three-bedroom house with a tiny living room/dining room/kitchen area, and we’ve had years when we’ve all had to pack into there for the holidays. Last year, there were eleven people under her roof: Aunt Kathy and Uncle Guintar in Grandma’s bedroom, their daughter Kimmie sleeping on the floor by the bed, Mom and Dad in the guest bedroom, my cousins Sean, Dennis, Chris, and my brother Eric in the den (THAT was a sight), and Grandma on the couch in the living room. I got the floor by the couch. Trust me -- that was quite a weekend.
So usually we make a point of spending the holidays at Aunt Char’s, which has considerably more space, even though it still feels small. Especially for me, since the only two cousins who are my age (Brian and Julie, far left and second from the right) either have step-family we have to share them with, or live in Florida now. So most of the time it’s just me, Kimberly (who’s about 9) and four hyper little boys. And Kimmie usually joins in with them, leaving me with the adults. Not a lot of fun.
So holidays at Aunt Char’s usually mean constantly being run into by the aforementioned hyper little boys, many interesting smells which you never, EVER try to identify, and feeling like some sullen teenager because you never get enough sleep and you have loads of homework to do but there isn’t anyplace quiet to work and dammit, if Dennis throws another GI Joe at your head you’re going to rip his arm off and throw it into the oven with the turkey!
Whoa! Flashback!
But that’s only before dinner -- and when those interesting smells are replaced by delicious ones, it is easy to let negative karma drift away and float to the kitchen to help pour milk and finish stirring green beans. The adults have recently started letting me sit at the table with them (I think they started after I beat most of them at Trivial Pursuit at Thanksgiving one year), and so I ignore those hyper little boys and their female apprentice and help them get settled down. Then after they’re too busy shoving food into their mouths to make noise, we sit down to eat. In another room.
The turkey has never been tender in all the years I’ve eaten with them, but the delicious gravy always masks that, and the stuffing is to die for. Of course, I don’t really eat too much -- I just don’t as a rule -- but the food is wonderful, and I never feel hungry after leaving the table. Dessert comes later, but for now, we all just sit. And talk.
A year’s worth of jokes and stories are told at the table -- sometimes lapsing into two or three separate conversations, but mostly remaining limited on one subject or two, the conversation never losing its relaxed tone. As I sip the sparkling cider slowly, cool against my tongue, I feel at home, calmer, more relaxed. And as I raise my voice to make a point, everyone turns to me and regards me as an equal, and I realize something.
This is family.