Countdown

Now that we're officially into Christmas season, my son regularly asks "how many days until Christmas." He's been working on his wishlist for months and continues to add to it.  Today he can stop asking me, because today he starts eating the chocolate in his advent calendar. And he can figure out how many days until Christmas by how much chocolate he hasn't eaten yet. Maybe. The math they're teaching kids these days isn't the math that I learned. No simple equations for these kids, nosireebob.

Meanwhile, back in the kitchen, I have been decorating. I put out the ceramic tree that lights up. The really cool tree that has trains going around it and plays Christmas carols. The wood and metal trees that do nothing, but add to the overall festive ambiance. There are candy canes and colored lights. I put lights and "greenery" on my mantle in the living room too. From a distance it looks like greenery. From close up it looks like plastic and wire.

When I was a girl my dad had a silver tinsel tree decorating the showroom of his business. That was the coolest tree. It had one of those rotating lights with the different colored gels focused at it so it would change color. For some reason, in those long-ago days of yore, fire code did not allow businesses to put lights directly on the tree. Or, maybe my dad just told me that to shut me up.

For me, Christmas was, and is, all about the lights. Colored lights. None of those bland, tasteful white lights for me. I want to see color in the dark. And I want to see that color reflected in the tinsel. My husband doesn't like the tinsel and whines about it every year. But frankly, I don't think he has any right to complain since he never really helps with the tree or any of the decorating.

My husbands uncle's wife (not to be confused for my husband's aunt - she's younger than me) puts up her Christmas decorations the day after Halloween. It must be a massive undertaking and I have to assume it takes days. I couldn't stand to look at Christmas that long. Apparently, neither can she, for they all come day the day after Christmas.

Our decorating tastes run in different directions. Mine are more traditional, less fiber-optic than hers. I like a formerly live tree, and the old fashioned lights that raise the temperature in the living room by at least five degrees, with the tinsel that you throw at the tree and it sits there in lovely unkempt clumps. Her tree is huge, artificial, and tastefully decorated. Her taste in general runs more toward country. Mine is more funky/eclectic which translates into the post-college-ran-out-of money-for-nice-furnishings category. Never mind that I don't have enough fingers and toes to count the number of years I've been out of college. There are one or two nice pieces. Some really good art and photos, and way too many books.

Maybe Santa will bring something nice for my home this year. Especially when he sees how nice my tree will look. Unless, of course, he trips over the trains on the floor. Then I may only get a law suit for Christmas.