“They want you to say Grace,,, the Bless-sing,” Uncle Lewis shouts to the hearing-impaired Aunt Bethany.
Bethany bows her head. The others at table do the same.
“I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America…”
Cousin Eddie stands, hand over his heart, as he and the others join in.
“Amen,” says Clark, exasperated, when the prayer finishes.
Maybe not the typical holiday gathering as portrayed in Christmas Vacation, but not too far off. Each year, in non-pandemic times, families gather to celebrate their common identities, quirks and all.
Aunt Bethany wraps up her cat as a present.
“Honey, have we checked the shitter?”
Eddie drives off in the tenement on wheels to kidnap Clark’s boss.
And yet, we gather the next year and laugh about the past, as we search the Christmas tree for that odd noise.
Blessings come in all shapes and sizes. We may hope to never again be entered into the fruit-of-the-month club, “The Gift that keeps on giving.” But we know that our friends and family define and magnify us as surely as if we were in a lab under a microscope.
Human interaction, consistently reenacted, define us as a species, and is a gift from the Almighty, though sometimes it seems like a gag gift.
Did the Wooly Mammoth connect thousands of Christmas lights and bring down the power grid?
Did the Tyrannosaurus Rex ride a sled into a port-a-potty?
Did the big-eared hopping mouse fall through the attic floorboards onto his son’s bed.
No, no, and no. And yet they’re extinct and we’re not. We are blessed to survive and thrive because of our oddities and commonalities.
“The little lights aren’t blinking, Clark?”
Bethany bows her head. The others at table do the same.
“I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America…”
Cousin Eddie stands, hand over his heart, as he and the others join in.
“Amen,” says Clark, exasperated, when the prayer finishes.
Maybe not the typical holiday gathering as portrayed in Christmas Vacation, but not too far off. Each year, in non-pandemic times, families gather to celebrate their common identities, quirks and all.
Aunt Bethany wraps up her cat as a present.
“Honey, have we checked the shitter?”
Eddie drives off in the tenement on wheels to kidnap Clark’s boss.
And yet, we gather the next year and laugh about the past, as we search the Christmas tree for that odd noise.
Blessings come in all shapes and sizes. We may hope to never again be entered into the fruit-of-the-month club, “The Gift that keeps on giving.” But we know that our friends and family define and magnify us as surely as if we were in a lab under a microscope.
Human interaction, consistently reenacted, define us as a species, and is a gift from the Almighty, though sometimes it seems like a gag gift.
Did the Wooly Mammoth connect thousands of Christmas lights and bring down the power grid?
Did the Tyrannosaurus Rex ride a sled into a port-a-potty?
Did the big-eared hopping mouse fall through the attic floorboards onto his son’s bed.
No, no, and no. And yet they’re extinct and we’re not. We are blessed to survive and thrive because of our oddities and commonalities.
“The little lights aren’t blinking, Clark?”