We’ve had a wonderful snowstorm up here in New Hampshire! (my parents’ home)
This is a view from the living room window across the Connecticut river into Vermont:
Merry Christmas! And happy Chinese food and movie day to my Jewish friends!
Wow, that’s amazing!
My god, I’m so full from Christmas dinner. But it was so goooood.
I feel awful for missing wishing you all a Merry Christmas and the chance to showcase our tree, which my gf slaves over despite it being a very modest little cheapo reusable tree from Walmart when we first moved in together and were super hella poor. Thing is, the girl loves Christmas something fierce. She had a very, very tough, painful childhood. But when she was young–maybe 6 or 7–she had a couple of surprisingly decent Christmases as her parents (otherwise awful, unsalvageable people) tried to pretend to love each other and the kids alike for just a few weeks each year, and it was deeply formative for her; ever since, she’s associated Christmas with genuine peace and happiness. And thus our modest but much-loved Christmas decor. So I am going to stomp in, 9 days late, and Christmas-wish and Tree-Post now!
Merry Christmas you glorious human beings.
My parents’ tree is ludicrously overstuffed, but tbh, I do kinda like it, and it’s actually got all the presents under it:
You seem like a truly caring and decent guy Armando - so I’m glad she ended up with you and at least has an adult life with a caring person.
Nice tree and belated Merry Christmas!
Thanks, Rob; that’s a remarkably, deeply kind thing to say.
I’m feeling kinda sappy now, so storytime:
Arika often claims that falling in with “the right group” in mid-high school basically turned her life around. She’d been running with a bunch of druggy skater folk the first couple of years, missing class and falling way behind in math in particular. As she and I got closer, she kinda pulled more and more into my friend group (most of whom she was already friendly with). We weren’t the straight-and-narrow Fellowship of Christian Athletes types or even the preppy rich kids, more the weirdass band kids, theater geeks, and choir singers, but most of us gave half a shit and didn’t get up to anything too untoward at school itself. I tutored her back up to speed in math, taking a girl who had nearly flunked the Remedial Math 1 course in 9th grade (which was, technically, basically 7th grade level math) up through Pre-Calc with a B average by 2nd semester 12th grade. I also coincidentally started dating her :)
She’s tough as shit and smart as a whip, and thus I am pretty sure she’d have figured things out on her own soon enough, but knowing we could be there as a good influence and support system to make that process easier does feel pretty awesome in the end. And obviously her drive, ambition, and care for me have helped me in my life enormously, always pushing me forward and refusing to let me settle or get lazy. I’d probably have eaten myself to death by 30 if she hadn’t showed up and given me a reason to keep myself around.
And all cuz, on some level, she overheard me talking about Lord of the Rings in gym class in 9th grade and decided to walk around the bball court with me and another guy instead of continuing to hide up in the bleachers with her stoner buddy Staci :)
That is a great example of how having good people in your life can make all the difference in the world! I enjoyed hearing how things worked out and it’s nice to read a feel-good story instead of the usual stuff - like some poor guy getting swatted. Thanks for sharing Armando :-)
Yeah, I’ll echo what Rob said: great to hear your story and you sound like a great friend and partner. Hope you had an awesome Christmas Armando.