white
"Mark, the children. MARK! The CHILDREN!" A large, maternal looking woman points an insistent finger just past her husband's right leg at two, zippy blond messes who are presumably their offspring. Mark didn't seem to be paying attention but turns and quickly rounds up the cherubic blurs. And thus begins the holiday season.
It's two days after Thanksgiving and I am standing in the entrance of Pea Soup Andersens. It's the mecca of pea soup lovers. A long time ago, the Andersen family settled in California and started selling pea soup to travelers rolling up and down the West Coast. Seriously, it's some really good pea soup. Thick but not too thick. Green but not too weirdly green. It warms. Whenever I drive up north, I have to stop for a bowl. It's my tradition.
I really love Christmas. I love the idea of cozy and cinnamon and mittens and frosty breath and rushing around with packages for the people you love. But in Los Angeles, when I wear my mittens people say "How cute... mittens." This is not the holiday I grew up with nor imagined after seeing many a television special. It's 70 degrees and I'm putting on a scarf and a wool sweater. There is no frost on my breath and as Christmas carols play inside my head, I am confronted with the incongruous images of LA Christmas.
...Just hear those sleigh bells jingling, ring ting tingling too... Traffic on the 101 is SO BAD. I'm 20 minutes late for work. This is more like a sleigh crawl than a sleigh ride. I want to impale myself on my stick shift.
...And since we've no place to go, Let it snow! Let it snow! Let it snow... I'm putting on my sunglasses because there are no clouds but plenty of airheads and no snowflakes, just cocaine.
...Have yourself a merry little Christmas...Make the yuletide gay... I make my whole year fucking gay and I'm fucking fabulous.
...Silver bells, silver bells, it's Christmas time in the city... And I can't find my phone. I can hear it ringing but I think it fell under the passenger seat.
Oh the jubliant tones of the French horn. Ah the choir. There are moments when I am whisked away to a festive alternate universe where mistletoe is for real and barns still exist for parties. Men wear top hats and children say "please" and "thank you" instead of "chickenhead" and "it's on and poppin'." They don't mean Mary Poppins. But when I thud back to earth, I'm in a fluorescent daze. Where's the country home with the big huge window where I can decorate the twenty foot Christmas tree? Where's the sleigh with the Clydesdales and the big heavy blankets for my lap? I don't want to watch the fireplace on TV, I want to have it in front of me, threatening to singe-slap my eyebrows while I scald my tongue on creamy homemade hot chocolate. Oh yeah, and why am I not White with blond ringlets and rosy cheeks. I'm dreaming of a White Christmas. White like the Brady Bunch.
I'm going to ask Santa for a new skin tone this year. I want to go caroling. I want to travel back in time and ride a fucking sleigh to the county post office to send my Christmas cards back east. I want to have a glittering laugh and sip egg nog in a high collared white shirt and a big hoop dress. I want a oil painting of a holiday season. No online shopping, no Starbucks gift certificates, no bbq on Christmas Eve. I want it old school with real sticks of cinnamon and the real Tchaikovsky conducting the Nutcracker ballet. I want pine scented everything. I want to attend a Bing Crosby concert where he does his weird talk-singing through all the hits. I don't want to sit on Santa's lap, I want to imagine his fat ass leaving me a wooden pony or a tea set. I want cookies with more chocolate chips than ingredients listed on the plastic packaging. I want, I want, I want. Maybe I am not so old-fashioned afterall.
It's two days after Thanksgiving and I am standing in the entrance of Pea Soup Andersens. It's the mecca of pea soup lovers. A long time ago, the Andersen family settled in California and started selling pea soup to travelers rolling up and down the West Coast. Seriously, it's some really good pea soup. Thick but not too thick. Green but not too weirdly green. It warms. Whenever I drive up north, I have to stop for a bowl. It's my tradition.
I really love Christmas. I love the idea of cozy and cinnamon and mittens and frosty breath and rushing around with packages for the people you love. But in Los Angeles, when I wear my mittens people say "How cute... mittens." This is not the holiday I grew up with nor imagined after seeing many a television special. It's 70 degrees and I'm putting on a scarf and a wool sweater. There is no frost on my breath and as Christmas carols play inside my head, I am confronted with the incongruous images of LA Christmas.
...Just hear those sleigh bells jingling, ring ting tingling too... Traffic on the 101 is SO BAD. I'm 20 minutes late for work. This is more like a sleigh crawl than a sleigh ride. I want to impale myself on my stick shift.
...And since we've no place to go, Let it snow! Let it snow! Let it snow... I'm putting on my sunglasses because there are no clouds but plenty of airheads and no snowflakes, just cocaine.
...Have yourself a merry little Christmas...Make the yuletide gay... I make my whole year fucking gay and I'm fucking fabulous.
...Silver bells, silver bells, it's Christmas time in the city... And I can't find my phone. I can hear it ringing but I think it fell under the passenger seat.
Oh the jubliant tones of the French horn. Ah the choir. There are moments when I am whisked away to a festive alternate universe where mistletoe is for real and barns still exist for parties. Men wear top hats and children say "please" and "thank you" instead of "chickenhead" and "it's on and poppin'." They don't mean Mary Poppins. But when I thud back to earth, I'm in a fluorescent daze. Where's the country home with the big huge window where I can decorate the twenty foot Christmas tree? Where's the sleigh with the Clydesdales and the big heavy blankets for my lap? I don't want to watch the fireplace on TV, I want to have it in front of me, threatening to singe-slap my eyebrows while I scald my tongue on creamy homemade hot chocolate. Oh yeah, and why am I not White with blond ringlets and rosy cheeks. I'm dreaming of a White Christmas. White like the Brady Bunch.
I'm going to ask Santa for a new skin tone this year. I want to go caroling. I want to travel back in time and ride a fucking sleigh to the county post office to send my Christmas cards back east. I want to have a glittering laugh and sip egg nog in a high collared white shirt and a big hoop dress. I want a oil painting of a holiday season. No online shopping, no Starbucks gift certificates, no bbq on Christmas Eve. I want it old school with real sticks of cinnamon and the real Tchaikovsky conducting the Nutcracker ballet. I want pine scented everything. I want to attend a Bing Crosby concert where he does his weird talk-singing through all the hits. I don't want to sit on Santa's lap, I want to imagine his fat ass leaving me a wooden pony or a tea set. I want cookies with more chocolate chips than ingredients listed on the plastic packaging. I want, I want, I want. Maybe I am not so old-fashioned afterall.
posted by Katie at 11:31 AM
1 Comments:
mittens. kittens wear mittens to steal pie. thus the kittens must die.
"silver brown packages tied up in strings...gold kettles with warm woolen mittens..."
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