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If my day today was made into a film the first third would be without dialogue.  Christmas morning started not with the excitement of little voices and the sound of paper ripping, but as I rolled over in my darkened room and looked at my alarm clock, it read 9:47.  I rose from my bed and walked out to the kitchen counter to check my cell, one message, I listen it was my sister.  I looked at the little tree sitting in the corner, gifts wrapped and stacked underneath, sitting in silence as they have for the last couple days.  It’s into the shower, I glance in the mirror, an old, disheveled, haggard man stares back.  I get dressed, jeans, thermal shirt and a button up over it, nothing fancy, festive only in it’s green color.  A granola bar makes breakfast, while I check my email and watch some Disney World Parade on TV.

My gray messenger bag doubles as my diaper bag, I stock it with 2 hoodies ( One for each kid, just in case it gets cool), a couple extra diapers (the polka dot kind Bing prefers), Camera, Flip-Vid and some wet wipes.  I put a couple gifts from under the little tree into a Target bag for the kids to open at my sisters.  I survey the apartment one more time, just to make sure it is kid ready, it passes my visual assessment.

As I walk the hallways of my building there is an unusual silence, well, unusual for any other day of the week, but holidays in apartment mega-buildings mean people leave, not stay.  I walk across the parking garage and see no one, past the main entrance, which is closed for the holiday and out into the real world.  The neighborhood lacks it’s normal foot traffic and bus chaos.  I get to the Orange Line station and about 20 people are waiting for the bus, it arrives early and we all board, there is ample seating for us all.  A woman sits by me and says “Merry Christmas”, I reply in kind, but then she asks for a dollar, I explain to her that I have no cash (And I really didn’t), she moves on to ask others on the bus.  My guess is drug addict, she was jittery and had that nervous energy that addicts have.  I started to think about if I had cash would I give it to her, I think yes, she only wanted a dollar and it’s Christmas, so I think I would have?  But then she comes back and asks if I have a cell phone, I say no, which was a full on lie, but it seemed sketchy to let this strange person use my phone… I don’t know why, but it just felt wrong.  The bus slowly emptied as we traveled it’s route and by Reseda it was totally empty, save for me and the driver.  It was strange to be on a huge bus all by myself, on Christmas, watching the sunny valley suburbs pass by the windows.  In L.A. no one uses mass transit by choice, we drive here, if you’re on the bus something has gone wrong in your life, you just know this when you board, you know this when you look around.  It is very different from other cities that way, when you ride the bus here it is your only option, and the only way it could be worse is if you don’t have the buck twenty-five it costs to ride.

We reached my stop and I got off, a man on the platform served as my replacement as “only guy on the bus.”  I walked through my sisters neighborhood to her house, shoulder bag on, target sack at my side.  The day was so beautiful, the sun was warm and embracing as I strolled thought the desolate streets.  I arrived at my sisters and the first line of dialogue of my day happened, Ethan said, “I don’t know why our door is locked?”  I responded “Mom does it.”  And I was in.  The day gets so much better from this point.  We cook and prepare as we wait for the kids arrival.  I make fettuccine Alfredo, my Mom veggie meatloaf, Angela pie and Ethan bread.

The doorbell rings, standing there are the kids and their mother, the exchange is made and Christmas officially begins.  There is food, gifts, game playing and Bing running around like a mad man.  This is the end of my Christmas season, which really was less than 7 days between Thanksgiving and today when the kids were actually over, and we are having a really good time.  The kids are beat, this is the second of three Christmas celebrations they will have today, the final was gifts at my apartment.  I wanted them to see my place as home, and have some sort of Christmas here too, so I didn’t want to bring everything to my sisters.  It was time to leave, we drive back, Bing falls asleep in the car, Lucy and I re-cap the day, she tells me all about the Barbie Pet Vet set she got at her Moms, and all about Christmas at their house.

We opened gifts here, they were excited and they loved everything and we had to try and play with everything… Bing is remarkably good at “Don’t Break The Ice”, the kid loves anything that involves a hammer.  But they are beat, so I convince them that the toys will still be here tomorrow and get them to bed.

And now I sit here, again no dialogue, in my quite apartment, littered with toys.  Knowing that this is now the rule and not the exception, thinking about how much it sucks when a good day ends, and you want to keep it going even when you know it’s over.  Like when you were a kid and you didn’t understand why your parents were making you leave the party.  They would say things like “everybody is tired” or “They have to clean up”, but you just wanted to stay and keep everything going like it was.  Taking in that weird feeling that tomorrow is not Christmas, it’s just another day, and the chance at recapturing this feeling is a year away.

I guess if I learned anything today, it’s that sometimes you have to take a sad, lonely bus ride to get to a place filled with joy and love, and when you arrive enjoy every moment.

This entry was posted on Saturday, December 26th, 2009 at 1:17 am and is filed under DadJack Blog. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.