Cat Stevens.
God Damn.
Let's not pretend to not know where this is going...oh wait this is the "internetz," and the gossamer veil of anonymity reigns supreme. Kinda. Thanks to blogs, social media, and compulsive instant gratification we've come to easily gain information on anyone anywhere. Personally, if you're one of my pals well then you know what happens when I start playing Cat Stevens on a loop. If not a pal, one google, or poking about in the facespace you'd know exactly what I'm talking about. However, if you're like me and happen to put limitations on socially acceptable internet stalking you have no idea what I'm talking about. If so...that's just grand. Swell. Gives me a reason to continue to write this silly little blog.
On the topic of Cat Stevens...it's a tall tale sign that I'm pining away for the people I love the most, they also happen to double as the people who I happen to deem as the most annoying. It's funny sort of cosmic biological joke, that the people that you love the most, parents, siblings, grandparents, whatever...these blood relations are so intricately woven into the makeup of your heart of hearts that it's impossible to not find them annoying. Get it? No? It's that whole idea of loving someone so much you find them annoying and having to live with one's parents for X amount of years well...it's easy to see how you , them, us...we're annoying. But you still love them. You still miss them and all those banal domestic eccentricities.
I miss it...I miss them.
I miss the sound of my Mother running in circles (literally) at an ungodly hour and her passive aggressive way of getting us up in the morning. She bangs pantry doors shut, whistles, doesn't turn on stove all the way so the stove does that blood curdling ticking sound so the gas is the only thing coming out, and then walks away to talk wayyyyyyyyy to loudly on the phone at 7 am! I miss it.
I miss my Dad's paranoia. I do. I miss the look of utter suspicion and indignity he give my brother and I when ever he catches us speaking English. He assumes that whenever it looks like we're having a deep conversation, IT HAS TO BE ABOUT HIM. NEGATIVELY ABOUT HIM! It's not. But he thinks so. I miss that craziness.
I miss my Brother's know it all attitude. He's 18...he has no idea. I like watching him figure it all out and getting it all wrong. I miss that. Even his gross "mustache."
I miss my Grandmother's sly way to giving me a "jesus" talk. She fears me too progressive and masculine that my soul just may be in jeopardy! It's not. My soul is fine. Although, I love her for being so worried for it.
I'm the independent sort. It's not like I don't miss them when it's not the holiday season, it's just my absence from them is more apparent during this time of year. I won't be able to go home this Christmas or New Years. In fact this is the first time I'm away for such major holiday's. I know...in a functional family such a situation would be terrible, but not as depressing. I come from a classically dysfunctional Hispanic family... as crazy as we all are we're a tightly knit group of crazy.
A few weeks ago I got off the Harvard stop in Cambridge. As I made my way up the escalator to be at street level to meet a someone at Urban..I passed this little Chinese looking lady playing/singing "Feliz Navidad" by Jose Feliciano. This is going to read as terribly cheesy (as if it wasn't already), but fuck...I teared up. That's my favorite Christmas song. It just hit me all at once. No Rosca de Reyes. No aunts and uncles prodding me for information that really is none of their business. No cousins to get incredibly drunk with as we try to pay attention to our mothers recite something that mimics cult like chanting at the feet of one of family members JUMBO sized nativity scene. No kissing a plastic baby jesus at midnight. No getting yelled at that doing do is like praising a false idol and hence a BIG TIME sin against their suddenly sprung Catholicism. No wayy to much fun, churros, tamales, bunelos, queso fresco, rosca, frijoles de la hoya, salsa casera, tequila with tio pancho, no fixin' white russian's for the older ladies of the family, no...nothing.
Sigh. So I'm listening to Cat Stevens. It reminds me a lot of my Dad...and then it just snowballs. I'm not helping myself, I know. Also, UM, soooo not funny whoever is pulling the strings of life! I've noticed this really strange pattern of having the charlie brown christmas song playing whenever I'm tired at work or when I get bad news of some sort. No really...it's been happening. Repeatedly.
It's silly to feel this way about a holiday...I know. I just love Christmas and my family. It's time like these I realize I haven't really grown up at all. It's gonna be rough Friday to Saturday. I think I've done a good job at hiding just how terribly I feel for not being present for the celebrations at home. I think? Maybe? Meh.
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