The Christmas Script

You know how watching a favorite movie never gets old? No matter how many times you've seen it and how many time you will watch it again, it's always exciting. You know how it ends, you know the minor plot points, you may even be able to recite most of the lines from it, but it never gets old. That's like Christmas in my house.

Christmas in the Coombs household is just about the same every year, and I don't just mean our (however warped) traditions. Let me paint a picture for you. Since we are not "ethnic" people (the term WASP is incredibly well-fitting to my family), we don't really have "ethnic" traditions. My brother especially envies the Italians (who are a dime a dozen in Youngstown) who have a huge feast of seven fishes and pasta on Christmas eve. While we tend to not agree on much, my brother and I agreed early in life that we needed some Christmas traditions, even of they were strange and of our own making. We pushed for things to be done the same way from year to year so that we had some traditions to speak of. Thus, Sandwich Day was born. Every Christmas eve, my grandparents go to a Jewish deli and get a bunch of pastrami and corned beef, along with some rye bread, and that is the main course of our Christmas eve dinner. We eat deli food on Christmas eve. Sandwiches on rye with dijon, potato salad, macaroni salad, chips and dip, veggies and dip, kolachi, and of course, a plate full of Mom's Christmas cookies.

It's come to the realization of my brother and I that these things happen so similarly every year that you could write it down, even certain things that are said, and it would be the same as last year, and it will be the same next year. So was born the idea of the Christmas Script. For your own amusement (and mine too), I will attempt to convey some of the hilarity that comprises our Christmas traditions.

Rather than attend our usual Methodist church for Christmas eve services, we go to the Presbyterian church that my grandparents attend and that my mom grew up in. This church has a very small congregation, but they are a spirited group. Even though the choir is not very talented, they attempt every year to sing some sort of anthem that is slightly above their level, much to the giggles of my brother and I and two of our childhood friends who attend there. We light the candles near the end of the service and sing "Silent Night" while paying more attention to the hot wax that threatens to drip through the paper drip guard onto our hands at any moment and burn them rather than the song. For some time, this danger prompted us to bring scotch tape to church so that we could tape around the drip guard, thus covering all of the wax's routes of escape that led to our hands. After the service, we, along with y grandparents, head back home. Here is where the real script begins. As soon as we walk in the door, my mother is the first to speak. "Don't change your clothes yet, we have to take pictures!" These pictures are taken in front of the Christmas tree every year, and we probably have enough of them to wallpaper our living room. Every combination of children, parents, and grandparents is photographed, and when we've reached the point of painful smiles, we are finally allowed to change into something more comfortable.

Then the feast begins. Sandwich Day lives up to its name.
Mom: (to Grandma and Papa) How much do I owe you for the meat?
Grandma and Papa: Oh nothing! Don't worry about it!
Mom: This stuff is expensive! You sure?
Grandma and Papa: Yeah yeah, you enjoy it.
The building of sandwiches begins, and we pile our plates high with the food that we can get any time of the year, but for some reason is so much better on Christmas eve.
Mom: Geez, we don't need all this food! Our pants don't fit as it is!
Everyone else: Yeah yeah yeah (as we continue to pile it on).
At this point, my brother grabs the remote and turns the TV onto another tradition: 24 hours of "A Christmas Story" on TBS. My parents are among the few and proud who actually saw this classic in the theaters and they watch it every year, but it's the same lines that always evoke a laugh, and the same discussions that always come up. How historically accurate the sets and costumes are, with the exception of the Mom's hair. How my Dad remembers picking out a Christmas tree in the same manner portrayed in the movie. How Mom remembers Red Life Boy Soap, but never had her mouth washed out with it. How my Dad loves the made-up swear words uttered by the Dad in the story, and wonders if that was scripted or if Darren McGavin just ad-libbed the whole thing. And even though we watch this every year, we can always count on Grandma to ask the question.
Grandma: Oh, what movie is this? Aw, isn't that little boy cute.

Then comes gifts, and while they vary somewhat from year to year, I can usually count on getting hand cream and stationery from my Grandma. And no matter how much or how little we have collectively spent on my grandparents (they are in their late-80s and don't need much, so it's usually a restaurant gift certificate), they always insist on telling us the same thing.
Grandma and Papa: Oh, you folks didn't have to do this, really. You do enough for us.
Mom and Dad: Oh come on, it's Christmas!
After that, we all settle down for the night. My brother, in his wish for some kind of "ethnic" tradition, stays up and watches the Pope give the midnight mass, but ends up making fun of it because of his cynical nature.

My parents have noted that they can tell we are growing up because they are now the ones waking us up on Christmas morning. Since Christmas dinner is always either at our house or at my Aunt and Uncle's in Akron, we either have a lot of cooking or a lot of traveling to do, and that is my mom's justification for moving us along.
Mom: Come on, get up! We have to do Christmas, we have a schedule to keep! Don't roll back over! GET UP!!!
As most teens and college students hate being woken before they are ready to get up, this (along with my mom's incessant yelling) is cause for a lot of grumbling and dirty looks. When we finally drag ourselves to the living room, we each take our places in the usual chairs- somewhere along the line, we all started sitting in the same chairs on Christmas morning, so why should that change now?

Usually a few of the things that we get for Christmas are not surprises in the least, seeing as how my mom insists on buying us clothes, making us try them on, and then telling us "You're getting this for Christmas, okay?" These are the things that we sarcastically pretend to know nothing about. "Oh, it's just what I wanted, how ever did you know? And I bet it fits perfectly..."

Fast forward to Christmas dinner, where my brother and I are trying desperately not to make smart-ass comments about anything, while my Aunt keeps asking us the most ridiculously impertinent questions about nothing. At some point, everyone gets quiet while eating, and someone has to disturb the silence in the usual way. "Do not disturb the animals while feeding."

This all may seem weird, or even boring, but compare it to your own memories of holidays and family traditions. Would it seem right without it?

Until later....