Two Weeks in Five Snapshots

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There were twenty-two of us there, so to most people, it might have seemed like a lot. But compared to the hundred or so that had descended on the house the night before, it was calm and quiet. Sure, five of the twenty-two were three years old or younger, but it was small large group.

The tree filled the bay window, tinsel glittered off of every available bough. The bubble lights, those not tilted or cold, frothed happily. The scent of pine and cinnamon filled the space, but somehow never spread anywhere except that room. The three year old helped pass out the presents, the fourteen month old helped everyone open their presents, and the babies sat on their mamas' laps and watched with big eyes. There were screams of joy, hugs, and sweet kisses between those two that they thought we wouldn't notice. Paper was tossed carelessly aside as the fourteen month old grabbed the stuffed monkey intended for his baby cousin and put it into his mouth.

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The rain stopped, the weather cooled, and the snow started. And kept falling. And kept falling.

We shoveled the driveway, threw snowballs, and ran races in the snow. Eventually whittled down to a group of eleven, we found ourselves racing our sleds down the hill, and our nephew, all of five months old, got his first ever sled ride. The three year old grew tired, shrilly yelled, "my fingers are cold," and we all laughed, grabbed her, and wound our way back to the house for some hot cocoa with marshmallows.

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The Annual Get Together of my high school friends gets more raucous every year. The children get bigger, they are able to play by themselves more, and the parents get more relaxed. My friend C has a nine year old. Let's let that sink in for a minute. She has nine year old daughter. I have a plant and a slow cooker. I really can't compete.

There were more that the usual number of sad events this year for the group - divorces, deaths, job losses, and familial discord - and that made it difficult. It's hard to smile and laugh with someone whose husband has humiliated her and whose prospects for employment are slim. But laugh we did.

And later that night, after everyone else left, we sat with my friends N and S, played board games, ate chocolate covered cashews and fudge straight from my mother-in-law's kitchen, and gossiped about everyone who had just left.

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New Year's Eve. Marysville, Ohio. Four reasonably fun, well educated, and good looking people out for a good time. They head to the local Kmart, with all of six cars left in the parking lot, thinking perhaps it has closed early, as places are wont to do on "major holidays" in small conservative towns in the Midwest. Happily, the store was open, Valentine's Day displays were already set up, and Quelf was purchased.

As for the rest, Darth Vader was imitated, masks were made, cobras sculpted out of paper, Living in Sin was sung, and my husband belly danced and showed off an astonishing amount of belly button lint and an astonishing lack of body fat. Let it be so for I have spoken.

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Ten days, six states* later, we're in the home stretch. The end is finally, finally in sight. We're going to get home within thirty six hours. We pull off to a rest area in Indiana (or was it Illinois?). In our car, it is toasty. Outside, a strange cold front has moved through, and as we dash for the building, running and laughing, simultaneously holding hands and pushing each other away, I am made breathless by (okay, the running like hell in the cold without a coat) the knowledge that this was the reason I married him. Holidays with him. Rest stops in godforsaken lands with him. Whirlwind trips through the Midwest with him. Hours in the car bickering over music with him.

I am so happy to be home at long last.

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*Minnesota, Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Ohio