The Christmas Wrap-up

Christmas is finally over. I could break it down for you, tell you what happened each day since Christmas Eve, describe every event in detail to help you understand just how overwhelming it all was. But in order to do that I would need a better short term memory than I currently possess. The truth is I have forgotten exactly what happened on which date over these past four days. Nevertheless I will attempt to piece it together as follows:

Sunday, December 24th

We drove downtown to the Altria Theatre for our church’s Christmas Eve service at 9 o’clock in the freaking morning. When the service began with a fake-candle Silent Night, the world seemed to be spinning out of control, temporarily detached from its axis. It’s weird enough to be attending a Christmas Eve service in the morning, but to have it open with what is normally the show-stopping final number was quite disconcerting. Besides, the irony of singing the words silent night at daybreak seemed lost on our leadership team. However, the rest of the service was phenomenal. The music was inspired and skillfully performed, Pete’s spoken word was beautifully written and expertly delivered, and David’s message was pitch perfect for the moment. Still, having to squint into the brightness outside after the service was a reminder that it was now 10:00 and our brunch reservation at Tarrant’s West was calling. Since I had parked on the street instead of the time-suck parking garage, I made a hasty retreat and was sitting comfortably in the restaurant long before Paula, Ron and Ryan finally showed up. My breakfast pizza was exquisite. 

This is where it starts to get fuzzy. I can’t quite remember what we did after brunch but before our digital Zoom appointment with Patrick and Sarah that evening. I’m pretty sure I took a nap somewhere in there, but everything else is a blank.

Christmas Eve night featured the very first virtual stocking opening in Dunnevant family history. Due to circumstances beyond our control, Patrick and Sarah were not able to make the 9 hour drive home for Christmas this year, so there we were watching them opening Christmas pajamas live and in living color via a very jumpy internet connection which featured several screen freezes. It is quite possible to be in awe of and extremely grateful for modern technology while at the same time finding it annoying.

Monday, December 25th. Christmas Day.

Santa did not arrive at our house. Somehow the old man knew that the four of us were not having Christmas on the 25th. Instead, we would watch Patrick and Sarah open presents and let them watch us opening the presents that they sent us. Afterward, everyone went in to full-time slave labor mode as we launched ourselves into preparing our house for the arrival of the White family for Christmas. There would be fourteen of us for a huge lunch with all the trimmings, then several hours of gift exchanging and merry making. By the time everyone finally left, it once again gets a bit hazy. I seem to recall watching bits of a Christmas Carol, the animated version with Jim Carrie and Gary Oldman. Then some scenes from Elf, after which everything went black again.

Tuesday, December 26th.

The four of us along with the two very good dogs, Lucy and Jackson, finally were able to enjoy our Christmas together. We opened presents. We took a break to have the traditional breakfast featuring scrambled eggs with not one but two different flavors of hot sauce, lots of crispy bacon and Pam’s world famous orange cinnamon buns. After this amazing meal, we all felt sufficiently renewed to attack the unwrapping of the Christmas stockings. This is a long process that almost takes longer than unwrapping the regular gifts at Casa Dunnevant. We were finally done around 1:00, after which another killer nap was indulged. Christmas night Pam made steaks on an iron skillet with this killer butter and rosemary sauce drizzled over everything. Amazing. The drive around town looking at Christmas lights while eating donuts thing didn’t pan out, largely because no donut businesses were open!! 

Wednesday, December 27th

I actually made an appearance at my office this morning to take care of a couple of death claim related issues, a bummer of an intrusion of my real life into our little Christmas fantasy. But soon I found myself in the car driving out to Bill and Linda’s for the extended Dunnevant Clan Christmas. This involved a “light lunch” of chili, Italian beef sliders and a host of other deliciousness, followed by a desert cafe. In between all the eating, we all opened more presents and all us grownups looked on at the kids in amazement at how big they are all getting. Seems like only last week when they were all a bunch of ankle-biting toddlers. Now, they are all taller than us and speaking in complete sentences about subjects that none of the rest of us can understand.

As we were all packing up to head home I couldn’t help but think that Mom and Dad would have been proud of us…I think.

Tomorrow morning, Jon and Kaitlin will head back to South Carolina. Pam and I will hit the road to North Carolina to attend a wedding. The real world is growling at the door.