The Most Wonderful Time of the Year

I love the Christmas Season. It really is my most favorite time of the year. I love Christmas carols except I think I am getting old because the commercialized ones now grate my teeth.

We always had great Christmases when I was growing up. Everyone would be home and my father, my sister and my brothers and I would be in the kitchen cooking our noche buena dinner while my mother sits in the dining room, smoking a cigarette and talks to us through the door and changes the cd for us.

We have a twelve- (I think or fourteen) foot tree which is decorated with ornaments that we have collected through the years. We have some ornaments that are older than I am! Some are beautiful, some are kitschy and others plain ugly but they all go up (some in the back) and I personally think our tree is the most beautiful Christmas tree period (Oh Christmas Tree, Oh Christmas Tree! How beautiful your branch is!). I have a strong proprietary feeling for our tree, ever since the time my sister splurged some of her hard-earned money and bought a plethora of christmas lights and it took me three days to wind it up the tree. It took me four more days to get all the ornaments up. Ever since that time, I sort of became the person "in charge" of the tree. I don't care if I move into an apartment the size of a shoebox but I'm bringing that tree (and my twelve dining room chairs, but that's a story for another time) with me and putting it up every Christmas, even if it means I'll have to sleep at my brother's place because I can't get in my apartment for the tree.

We also have the belen which we take turns every year to design. To this day, I never remember to ask where we get the sand we use (yes we use sand, after all, they were in the desert, right?). I remember we grabbed little hand mirrors and buried them in the sand to make ponds and nicked my sister's glass animals to add more "color" to the landscape, never mind if the animals weren't indiginous to Israel (and that the rest of the figurines weren't made of glass).

Christmas became even more fun (for us kids, anyway) when we had pets that were allowed inside the house. Bijou, my sister's daschund, would knock down the low-hanging tree ornaments, and if it happened to be a ball, would chase it around the living room. So much so that we had to plan the tree very carefully. Sissypuss, our cat, was also notorious for swiping tree ornaments. However, the most memorable chrismas-decor-and-pet-incident was with the belen. We woke up one day to find the belen figurines knocked down. We correctly figured it was Sissy who did it. We also saw she did more than just knock down the figurines, she seemed to have moved the sand a bit. Well she was a cat, she probably thought it was nice of us to decorate her litterbox.

There are a handful of Christmases that stand out: When my dad suffered his heart attack he spent Christmas in the hospital. To get our minds off it, I don't know who suggested it (I was 8 at the time), we (the kids) were instructed to each cook a sauce for the beef fondue that we were going to have for our Christmas Eve dinner, which we were having at the hospital. I think our tradition of cooking Christmas dinner started there.

When my cousin Jayjay joined us one time and we (my parents and all five siblings with Jayjay as the Dungeon Master) played Dungeons & Dragons for days.

I remember the two consecutive Christmases we spent in Baguio with my other cousins, their parents and my grandmother. We stayed at the house of a family friend. One of my three cousins was paired off with one of my two brothers or myself and each pair was put in charge of either "the house" (taking charge of the keys, making sure there was enough firewood, etc), "the cars" (they were in good condition, stayed gassed up, would drive us around as needed, etc) or "the kitchen" (oversee the menu, make sure the food got served on time, would do the grocery, etc). I had a ball. Those were good Christmases. Wish we could do it again.

Another was the first time I didn't spend Christmas with my family. It was just my brother and I here in Bacolod. We couldn't afford the airfare back to Manila. Still it wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be. I remember that we were asked to bring eggnogg to the Christmas lunch at my Abuelita's. I got the recipe from my younger brother in Manila who told me to just use half since the recipe was for 40. So I did...that is, I did except for the cream. That eggnogg was so thick, you had to eat it with a spoon! It was good though.

And lastly, there was the Christmas we had here in Bacolod right after the "Eggnogg Christmas." It was the first Christmas our family spent here since we moved to Manila in '81. However, what made this one memorable was I pretty much took over the Christmas dinner that year. I cooked a mean bouillabaisse, which I ended up serving at 9pm because I didn't realize it would take so long to cook!

I remember as a kid finding it harder and harder to sleep as Christmas Day got closer. I also remember lying underneath the tree and looking up through the branches and marveling at all the christmas lights. I remember playing this really silly game with my brother Wanggo about Snow White the Zombie ("ooh a shiny red apple!" -- don't ask) for about two or even three Christmases.

I think it's grand that we've kept our traditions and even added some new ones. The olds ones: opening our presents at midnight, always having a Christmas ham, each family member takes a turn every year to be the one who calls out the presents, "adopting" someone who can't be with their family for Christmas; and the new ones: we now play Kris Kringle (and this year it now includes my cousins, my aunts and uncles and even my grandmother) and making paté for our family and friends.

I'm looking forward to this Christmas. Those who can be here will be here. The names for Kris Kringle have been picked. The paté list has been drawn up. The menu for both the dinner on Christmas Eve and the lunch on Christmas Day has been prepared. I've burned a new cd of Christmas carols. Oh wait...I haven't done my shopping yet!