xmas day 2011

sitting here on the sofa, pondering how i will fill my time, it came to me ..... time to write. getting a cup of tea ready, lunch has been eaten. a very easy one, bread and salmon, cheese and other goodies. so how come i do not have a big xmas lunch with the family as the italian tradition preaches? first off, how can one have a xmas lunch with sun outside would be my question to the enquirer. it is so not inspiring. that is what i found out the 25th of december 1993. i was on my own in locarno, sun and no snow. i took myself up the mountain towards s. bernardino above locarno. lordie, what was that day hot. it must have been 10 degrees or more, like today, and i got into a real sweat. but back to the italian lunch now. most people i hear, are complaining about having the family and inlaws at the house on first xmas day. i don't complain, i just do not have them over. after our children were born, we had a couple of times lunch at my hubbies parents' place, then another couple of times at my sister-in-law's house. i hated it. throwing away a day sitting around, being bored. the one day in the year that you are allowed to do nothing. and then there is nothing christmassy about the day when it feels like spring. feeling that it was my turn to organize something i said ok, but on my terms. doing it as my german heritage dictates it, the evening of the 24 th. it seemed that the whole world crumbled. it was a no go for the italian minds. well, either that or nothing at all. hubby dear was pulled over after a bit of fighting. my big motive was how will you enjoy my xmas decorations during daytime. i spent loads of time to pull everything together. my house, my rules, so it went the way i wanted it. we did it a couple of years in a row. big succes, not lasting too long, and a long day afterwards to recover from heartburn and other stuff. then i quit because i thought it would be time for my brother-in-law to take action for once. that never happened. yesterday we had another go at it, after we escaped it for 2 or 3 years in a row. my parents-in-law are getting older and i thought it would be nice to have all four grandsons around the table for once. everyone really appreciated it, it was nice. but this morning the man of the house said next year, no party, just the four of us is enough. we are lazy buggers, and pj-huggers.

merry xmas to all of you!