This week's classifieds are pretty pathetic. I see about four ads for positions that I've already applied for, and three more that I'm qualified for but almost certainly don't want for various reasons. Still, despite interviews of various sorts with six different companies, no one has made me any offers or put anything in writing yet, and I still have to apply for two jobs a week to collect my unemployment check, even if I don't actually intend to take the jobs. At least, not wanting the jobs, I don't have to sweat too hard over the cover letters.
But if the pickings are this slim next week, I'm going to have to start applying for jobs I'm not even halfway qualified for.
But it doesn't matter! The holidays are upon us!
I'm a Christmas freak. I'm not sure when it started, but I suppose at least some level of it has always been with me. It's magical, despite the fact that I don't consider myself a Christian anymore.
I can't remember finding out that Santa Claus was my parents. I do remember coming downstairs one Christmas Eve at the age of five or six to ask for a glass of water, and finding my parents stuffing the stockings, but I wasn't surprised then. I guess I'd accepted early on that Santa was a symbol who was best appreciated - though I didn't have the vocabulary at the time to express it - with a willing suspension of disbelief. Even now, my heart pounds when I see even a raggedy, stuffed, fake-bearded Santa ringing a Salvation Army bell.
It helps that my mom is a Christmas fan, too. For as long as I can remember, she's spent the entire month of December trying to tease my brother and I into telling her what her presents are. (One year when I was quite young, I magnanimously decided to offer her a clue: "It starts with H and ends with T and rhymes with bat!" Give me a break; I was five.) The great thing about Mom, though, is that she doesn't actually care what the present is. For her, it's all about the excitement of anticipation. And it's fun to play to it - I've seen her get hysterical with glee over pairs of socks (wrapped separately and differently, of course).
Every family has different Christmas traditions, so here are ours: Children under the age of ten or so may open one - and only one - present on Christmas Eve. Everyone may stay up as late as they like. If my grandmother is in town, we'll go to church, which I actually don't mind too much. Electric window-candles and tree-lights that have been turned off at bedtime all month will be left on all night. Stockings may be retrieved as soon as you awake Christmas morning - it's a last-ditch effort on the part of my parents to be allowed to sleep until the sun has risen. The opening of presents begins as soon as everyone is up and my mom has had a cup of coffee, and this is our most precise ritual: We take turns, going around the room. Each person must guess what's in a package before opening it. We've turned this into an elaborate game, involving careful shaking, pressing, sniffing, rattling, and poking. Having guessed, it can take upwards of ten minutes to actually open a package, because my father, brother, and I all try our hardest not to tear any paper, carefully slicing through tape with our pocketknives. (Mostly we do this because it increases the enjoyment of anticipation, but it's also fun because it drives my mom bezerk.) It has happened in our house that, with just four or five of us there, the opening of presents takes from six in the morning until after noon.
Christmas is one of the few days of the year that my mother will fix breakfast - usually something simple like eggs and bacon and toast, but when you only get it twice a year, it seems pretty special! (Last year, I was introduced to Matt's family's Christmas breakfast tradition: Breakfast is the platter of cookies their neighbor always gives them.) Then everyone usually takes a nap until it's time for dinner.
At any rate, I'm such a freak that still, at the age of 28, I wake up at 4 on Christmas morning and can't go back to sleep. Seriously. The year I was in the ninth grade, I slept until 8, but that was a fluke. At least I'm old enough now to quietly read a book or watch a movie or something while I wait.
Well, I just lost 45 minutes to two phone calls in rapid succession, and one of them was to set up an interview for this afternoon (with the desperate company that I don't really want to work for, but can't turn down until I get some other offers) so I'm going to post this and go have something to eat before I change.
Merry Christmas!
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