What I Got for Christmas

But for a brief visit by my mother in the morning, I spent Christmas 2010 alone.  Of course, I wondered at this.  It seemed familiar.  It was like the end of something.

I felt better but not well.  I decided not to go anywhere so as not to have to bathe.  A breakfast of coffee and a sweet bun.  For lunch, I cut open the pre-cooked ham I had thought to buy on Christmas Eve, sliced it thick and the loaf of sourdough bread as well.  I slathered it all in horse radish mustard and opened a bottle of cheap champagne I'd bought for mimosas thinking it would not make a difference.  I was wrong about that.  Still, the mimosas were better than the sandwich, so I had more.  The day wore on.

For Christmas, the cat got a furry mouse with a Velcro enclosed opening and a stoppered jar of catnip.  Over the years, people have given her other catnip toys, but she has never taken any notice.  I filled the furry mouse and threw it to her, and she fell immediately in love.  She bit it, held it, lay on it.  I had begun to believe that the whole catnip thing was a myth.  Now I'm worried about the it.  I mean, is this like throwing your kid a bag of pot and saying, "Enjoy"?  Will the cat's personality change?  I'm not kidding.  I worry.

The day was quiet.  I watched a streaming movie from Netflix.  My mother gave me a large flatscreen HD television for Christmas, and I had spent my sick days putzing around and setting it up.  It is amazing, really, some sort of technological miracle.  Size matters.  I am transfixed by the power of the thing.  I bought the whole movie package from the cable company, every movie channel.  A DVR.  Movies On Demand.  I got Apple TV so that I can stream Netflix and rent shows from iTunes.  I can even watch YouTube with it.  I will be saturated soon.  Sitting alone in the room, watching movie after movie, this was Christmas.

The phone never rang.

Toward evening, I walked outside.  The kids across the street were playing with Christmas toys.  Another neighbor's guest were putting opened gifts into the trunk of a car.  The wind was beginning to stir, visage of the coming front.  But for now, the sky was clear and going darker blue.  I thought about my father, dead forever now, the Christmases in the small rented house on the railroad tracks after the divorce.  Those skies were blue, too, and high, the sound of the wind coming from far, far away.

The year was ending badly, I thought, and I thought about what changes I would make.  I still have resources, though I've mismanaged much.  This year, I must not live in a cloud, I told myself with certainty.  I will pay attention, live with full awareness, with purpose.  There is much that needs to be done.

Back inside, I opened the bottle of McCallum's I'd bought on Christmas Eve during my short shopping foray.  I sat down to scan some of the hundreds of Polaroids I've neglected.  During the long scans, I read more of Burton's translation of "Arabian Nights."

When I had had enough of that, I went to the couch to finish the Steve Martin novel about the art world I had been reading.  The cat lay on the floor next to me cuddled up with her new drug rat.  I thought about people walking by on the street looking in.  I wondered what they might think.

It was eight.  My mother had told me earlier that she would bring me something to eat from dinner with the relatives, but I'd heard nothing from her.  One more drink, I thought, and then I would put a frozen enchilada in the microwave.  I sat down to watch another episode of "Boardwalk Empire," something the movie package had given me.  I liked it, watching it hours on end to catch up.  At ten, the phone rang.  I had not stirred.  It was my mother.

"I thought you were going to bring me something to eat?" I said.

"Oh.  I didn't think it would be very good."

"You should have called me at least."

"I'm sorry."

I hadn't managed to make the enchilada.

Late, after three hours of "Empire," I thought I should go to bed.  Christmas was over.  It was through.

I had tried not to think about all the people who had not sent greetings this year.  I tried not to wonder if an old girlfriend was in town.  I'd tried not to think about any of it at all.  Then, the last thing before bed, I had an email from a tragic girl from long ago.  She is a bit of a wrecking crew, tall, pretty, troubled.  She had been run over on her bicycle in South Beach, had been lying in her apartment taking Percocet for days to numb the pain.  She'd spent Christmas alone, she wrote.  How was I?

Much like you, I thought.  Much like you.