Catching up: what happened over the holidays
Loing-ish post ahead! Read at your leisure.
Life always has this interesting way of sending so many events in your direction like little explosions in so small a period of time. When you finally grab a hold of yourself, and finally decide to sit down and write about these, Life goes, "oh, glad to see you enjoyed them, here, have some more, on the house."
the last holidays were crazy for me. I'm sure once the fog clears of the strain of too-little-time-too-much-to-do, I'd be finally assured it was really an entirely good thing. Hmm. Better to take the bad with the good.
I escaped from my own house on Christmas eve to make a mad dash to celebrate it with James' family -- without his knowledge.
It all started when we planned to celebrate Christmas dinner over with his folks a few weeks before. The catch here was, he wouldn't be able to accompany me to his house that day, meaning I had to find my way from my place to his by myself. It's doable, I think to myself, I just need to remember the routes we took from Robinson's Galleria to his place, and you were paying attention, weren't you? James felt unsure about how well I could manage, but we decided to give it a go.
What further complicated matters was that I was also to spend Christmas lunch with Papa and his family. I had to tell James this over IM while he was at work the night of Christmas eve, and pretty much, it sent him worrying even more. After all the planning, the energy-consuming shopping, the careful scheduling... I thought to myself, screw this. If I'm going to make sure everyone's happy this Christmas eve, I'm going to make sure I'm happy too.
I called up James' house, and James' older sis was kind to have me over with them that night. After a few hurried minutes of packing the essentials and dressing, I rushed out to catch a cab and set out for Project 8. I got to their house in one piece. Dinner, presents, and much fun was to be had, and Tita Espie, his mom, let me sleep on his bed -- in full view of everyone in the household, of course.
And James had no idea about all this.
I remember being half-awake by 5am on christmas morning. James' voice called Merry Christmas to his mom, and Tita Espie lightly mentioned he had a surprise waiting for him on the bed. (of course, pretending to be asleep completes the whole scene.) A few light footsteps lead to the bed area; the sound of undressing and dressing, and finally, the sensation of someone climbing ito bed and slipping their arms around you to pull you close to snuggle. I remember feeling so warm.
Late morning came and a light breakfast came, and I prepped for Christmas lunch. Getting to UP from James' village was easy enough, and we set off for lunch at Max's Katipunan. After dropping off Mama S and Tita Daisy at home, Papa drove me over to see Tita Molly and the rest of the family to drop off a bottle of Coco Vodka. It was great to see Kuya Arif, Tad, and bards again. Selena and Edwina were off with their buddies, so a quick greeting on the phone was all good too. After that, I popped back home to Project 8 for dinner and Mech Commander on PC.
Told you it was crazy.
A few days after, Mama S and I rummaged through her things to pick out items I might need around the house. I'm glad I took the opportunity to do so. It was good to see Mama S so happy, helping her take a few things off her, and well... free handy stuff around the house is always good. :) I now have a brand new Meyer cookware set on my stove, back when Meyer was still Meyer. The bedsheets and towels Mama S gave me still need to go into the wash, and with so much, I really do think it's time to start giving away things too.
Here's a short video of the afternoon after:
New year's was spent with my mother's cousins. Tita Espie had wanted me over on that day too, but my I did say yes to my aunts first. (aaaaw. ) My housemate, Ate Osang, was in on it too, and told me to go escape while the old folks weren't looking. Hehe. So now, here I am, two weeks knee-deep in work again, the work predictably reaching higher and higher with each week passing. Now that I think about it, the first thing that flashes in my mind would be, "hey, where'd my holidays go?" but then.... Well, I'm thankful.Very, very thankful.
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