Reflections upon Christmas past and present

Less than a week now until Christmas. I'm still dutifully going to work everyday. You know it is a crime to work between Thanksgiving and New Year's? No one is around, everyone is checked out or taking long lunches to go Christmas shopping, or people are "sick" (they just want to save vacation days and burn up sick time). I am planning on taking my usual time off between Christmas and New Year's though - I need time for me. No work, no pressure of missing work since everyone else is gone too, just time for me. I have some miscellaneous medical appointments, perhaps I'll do some light cleaning, my friend Johanna and her fiancee Mark are in town so we'll visit, and I'll probably hang out with Heather as well.

We recently went through a very bad wind storm that left over 1 million people in Western Washington without electricity. We were lucky and only lost power for about 15 hours, but even as I type this in my 68 degree house, stomach full of hot freshly prepared food, listening to a Charlie Brown Christmas -- there are still people even in Seattle who have no electricity. I have read reports that some will be without electricity through Christmas. Ugh. As much as I may rant about work or other trivial things I truly am grateful for a warm house, a roof over my head, food, my friends and family, and my job.

This Christmas we are going to Yaki-vegas....er, Yakima. I was telling Andrew tonight that this Christmas will be only the second Christmas in my life that I would not have spent it with my family. Christmas 1997 - The Huskies made it to the Aloha Bowl, I got to spend a week in Hawaii and away from my family. I know, how horrible. Spending a whole week with friends, getting paid and all expenses paid for to go to a bowl game. Christmas Eve night rolls around and I was very homesick. It was also the first Christmas after my Grandmother had passed away, so I was very sad indeed. The Huskies went on to win the Aloha Bowl, and we were flying back to Seattle on Christmas Day. We approach Seattle and there is too much fog so we had to land in Portland. My friends and I got to spend the night of the December 25h 1997 on the floor of PDX. A greyhound bus came to PDX to drive us home on the 26th. I came home very sad and tired to an empty house. My parents weren't home for some reason and my brother was at work. I remember opening a present with my cat watching me.

Christmas 2006 in Yakima -- shouldn't be so bad. It couldn't be any worse than Christmas 1997, right? I'm not going to be sleeping on the floor of a PDX terminal. I'll be with people who are almost like family (we are not technically family yet as Chris and I are still dating). I understand that it is quite chilly (single digit temperatures) in Yakima right now. I hope the drive over will be fairly easy, the thought of chains and a potential 4 hour drive does not thrill me to say the least. This Friday I'll be at least having dinner and a pre-Christmas but really Christmas celebration with my own parents.

All in all as the days get closer to Christmas, the happier I feel. There is just something about Christmas -- how everyone is generally happier and friendlier. I can't wait for the day where I'll have my own kids and the excitement they will have for the holidays. :)