I know I promised an essay in this month’s @Cynthia’s Place, but it was a busy Holiday Season for Missy Reed, so the essay just didn’t happen. This is as far as I got writing about Rick and Brian’s Christmas Spectacular. But, like I said in my intro to @CP, I took a lot of pictures. Click on the link to @ Cynthia's Photo Journal if you feel like looking at them instead of reading part of an essay.

Christmas 2003, with Brian and Rick

Arlene said, “I expect to see Currier and Ives walking through that door any minute.”

I think I now know what it feels like to be Ernie or Silvia or Percy (their two dogs and cat): coddled, babied, indulged, and loved to itty bitty bits.

It was a crystal clear crisp blue sky morning as I settled into my seat. One of the many benefits of being little is that even the average bus seat affords me ample wiggle room for my legs; this particular trip the bus never got more than half full, so I got to spread out a little: my feet rested on my duffle bag, I sat my gifts (a George Forman Play-Doh Grill and a Go-Bot, for children at a Bucks County women’s shelter) on the aisle seat, and anchored my headphones under my giant red and white fuzzy hat and started blasting contemporary Christmas classics through my brain: Springstein’s Santa Claus is Comin’ to Town, Band-Aid’s Do They Know It’s Christmas (I would have listened to this one overandover, but it makes me teary and I thought it best to spare my bus-mates the image of a weeping woman in a Santa Hat), and the dreamy Harry Connick, Jr. singing (It Must Have Been Ol’) Santa Claus. I pulled out my journal and, while city gave way to industrial swampland gave way to airport which morphed into suburbs, I ruminated on the Meaning of Wearing a Santa Hat, and by the time I emerged from my meditation, the towns were becoming smaller, and the gardens were becoming farms.

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: it’s like The Fresh Air Fund for Grown-ups. I sat up, eager and enthusiastic, smiling out the window at the trees and the sky and the decorated houses and the little girl riding her pink bicycle in her driveway. My Inner Child cried, “Arewethereyet? Arewethereyet?” as we crossed the magnificent Delaware River; and it occurred to me (considering the possibility of a snowstorm the next day) what an American Holiday Tradition it is to cross the Delaware River in December and celebrate Christmas and get snowed in … what side of the river was George Washington stranded on? Focus, Cynthia! Where are we now? New Hope? We’re almost there! I wind my scarf around my neck and zip my coat and arrange my bags. I’m sitting upright in my seat as we pass the Annual Christmas Fair in Lahaska. “Arewethereyet? Arewethereyet?” Doylestown next left. I’m supposed to get off at the Shell station, so every time I see a gas station I perk up. No, that one’s Exxon. This one’s Sunoco. Oh, here it is! Shell! And I bumble excitedly down the aisle and off the bus.

A tired Brian emerges from the convenience store and carries my bags to his Jeep as I make a pit stop in the [clean!] restroom. I climb into the truck. What a week Brian had! The bought their Christmas tree last weekend in after the snowstorm; then work and late nights getting things ready. B made a quick call home. “Is there anything we should pick up? Ice? How much? 200 pounds? No, really. How much?” I’m thinkin’ someone wants to make his own snow, 200 pounds of ice! (And knowing Rick, he might just decide that would be a fun thing to do.) OK. So we de-dull the day of a big-haired, middle-aged convenience store clerk, loading up 25 8-pound bags of ice into the back of the Jeep. After a stop at the “redneck” hardware store (“You might want to take that hat off,” Brian warned. Hmf. Like they’re going to like the dreadlocks better. Whatever: they may have been rednecks, but they seemed like perfectly nice people to me.) to pick up some tubs to hold said ice.

We approached the house from the back, so we were in the driveway before I could see that the front porch had been tented in, a heating generator at either end—one for the guests, one for the bartender. I entered through the side door. The “mud room” was not muddy at all, an arrangement of evergreen boughs and a potted amaryllis adorned the window. There were caterers (Caterers? Jeez! No “bring a covered dish” for these guys!) buzzing around the kitchen. Brian told me that I’d be in the smaller guestroom (my favorite because it’s warmer), and I made my way upstairs to stash my bags and change my shoes. I grabbed my camera and went back to see if I could make myself helpful.

What could I add? Every detail was perfect. Every windowsill was lush with evergreens, flowers, candles; the tree, a gentle giant, brushed the ceiling; and he hearth! Oh god, Clement Clark Moore wept with joy at this huge, huge blazing fireplace, giant stockings “were hung by the chimney, with care”