{"id":569,"date":"2008-11-30T17:24:34","date_gmt":"2008-11-30T22:24:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.hoperoth.com\/blog\/?p=569"},"modified":"2008-11-30T17:27:14","modified_gmt":"2008-11-30T22:27:14","slug":"holiday-drama","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.hoperoth.com\/blog\/holiday-drama\/","title":{"rendered":"Holiday Drama"},"content":{"rendered":"

Reading this blog entry<\/a> got me thinking about holiday plans and how complicated they are now that I’ve become some sort of approximation of a real adult.\u00a0<\/p>\n

When I was little, getting two Christmases was the consolation gift for having our parents divorce. It was like Santa himself said, “I’m sorry that your parents split up, leaving a mom-sized hole in your heart when you’re with your dad and vice versa. But, hey, two stockings! Have some more eggnog. This whole divorce business isn’t so bad.”<\/p>\n

Some years we were lucky and we went down to Florida with my Step-Dad to see his family and OMG JACKPOT, three<\/em> Christmases!\u00a0<\/p>\n

Now that I’m older and have to negotiate the minefield that is family politics without Mom and Dad working things out between themselves, three Christmases is about two Christmases too many. If I’m feeling particularly Scrooge-ish, it’s three Christmases too many. We used to have a schedule (Thanksgiving with Mom and Christmas with Dad one year, then the next year we would switch). Now, we have a half-hearted attempt at a schedule. I try to compromise, but nobody ends up happy. Least of all Kristian, who usually ends up doing most of the driving.<\/p>\n

Some things are set. Christmas Eve is reserved for Kristian’s family, who always<\/em> celebrate on Christmas Eve, this is not up for discussion. Honestly, I LIKE having something that’s set in stone and that nobody can argue about. Everything else is up for grabs. Except that my older Sister (who I share a Mom with and not a Dad) doesn’t have much to do with the schedule. And my younger Sisters have other family commitments.\u00a0<\/p>\n

I can’t remember the last time that I spent Christmas with all three of my Sisters and that makes me sad.<\/p>\n

I also can’t remember the last time that figuring out our Christmas schedule didn’t feel like negotiating a cease fire between Israel and Pakistan. And that makes me even sadder.\u00a0<\/p>\n

This year, we’ll be spending Christmas Eve with Kristian’s family, as usual. And then we’ll be hosting 13 people on Christmas Day at our house from my Mom’s side (gah! I don’t have enough matching plates! what have I gotten myself into?!?). And then, at some point, we’ll drive down to Connecticut to see my Dad’s family. It’s a lot of driving. It’s not a lot of time in one place. But we’ll be filled<\/em> with the mother loving Christmas Spirit so help me baby Jeebus or I will be forced to shove candy canes up someone’s nose. Sideways.<\/p>\n

I don’t mean this post as a slam against my family. The drama doesn’t come from a place of meanness or nastiness. Everyone wants to see us because they love us and that’s never a bad thing. I love Christmas and I enjoy spending it with my family. If I could, I would spend a week with all of them. A whole eggnog soaked, candy cane fueled week.\u00a0<\/p>\n

What are your Christmas travel plans? Do you ever feel pulled in more than one direction? How do you compromise?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Reading this blog entry got me thinking about holiday plans and how complicated they are now that I’ve become some sort of approximation of a real adult.\u00a0 When I was…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[8,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-569","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-family","category-grumble"],"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p5yggS-9b","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hoperoth.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/569","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hoperoth.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hoperoth.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hoperoth.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hoperoth.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=569"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.hoperoth.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/569\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":572,"href":"https:\/\/www.hoperoth.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/569\/revisions\/572"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hoperoth.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=569"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hoperoth.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=569"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hoperoth.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=569"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}