Tuesday, December 21, 2010

Grandma Got Run Over By A Reindeer

Ah yes.  Christmas !! The time to be merry; thus, Merry Christmas !!   Christmas around the Daniels home is never dull.  We define the "Griswald" Christmas.  Always chaotic it seems - never enough laughter ;  for me, never enough booze.  Not been in the holiday spirit here as hard as I try. Maybe its because there's no kids in the house anymore.. My daughter will be 21 in a month, my son is 16 --they don't believe in Santa.  Shocker isn't it.. lol  This will be the 2nd Xmas without mom for us this year.. She died suddenly on Nov. 3, 2009 at 5:53 am .  Its wild how I can remember that...the date, exact time... I was talking to Mark and we were kinda venting about the holidays... We were gettng ready to hang up and I say, Well, i guess I'm gonna go and put that GOD DAMN  tree up.... I hear a roar of laughter on the other end of the phone.. The tree did NOT go up that day..  Being a  prelit tree, I set it up in the perfect spot... work for what seemed like hours fluffing its pre lit brances and just like the Clark Griswald, i plug it in..  ONLY 1/2 the freakin lights work. Now how am I gonna resolve this situation ? I take the damn thing BACK apart , throw it in the box and drag its 1/2 LIT ASS back across the yard and throw it in the storeage building... Merry Freakin Xmas, the holiday season begins..
The memories of Xmas past? Let me share one that sticks out in my mind...We call it "Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer" as this was the year that song become so popular.  Mom had hip replacement surgery aprx. 15 years earlier right around Christmas.  Tradionally, everyone comes to our house Xmas eve.. This particular year of the 'hip surgery' was one we talk about every year.. a tradition so to speak. Mom and Dad lives next door to us so mom had walked over to our house earlier that evening with her walker in toe.. *she had hip surgery, remember?  Sis and I are working in the kitchen, cooking, rushing, not enjoyng ourselfs but trying to prepair the feast of the evening. Mom is sitting there in her "DUSTER" as she called her cotton robe and looks outside and notices that it is beginning to snow.  I better get back to the house before it gets to bad she says over the noise in the kitchen; sis and i still prepairing the roast beast. Mom grabs her "WALKER" and starts out the door and leaves.  It's snowng pretty good outside now. I know at least 1/2 has passed and we start hearing ths scratching sound comng from outside.  Must be ice forming on the siding I think... sis and I working our ass off trying to get things finished before company comes a callin.  45 minutes surely has passed by now and I need vanilla for the candy I'm making.  I pick up the phone and call mom to see if she has some I can borrow... In the background sis says, What Is That Noise??  It's really getting on my nerves... Hell, I don't know and really could give a rats ass at this point.. I need vanilla..Dad answers the phone and I tell him to ask mom if she has vanilla I could borrow. His reply?  well isn't she still out there?  OK, at least an hour has past by this point.  I put the phone down, and tell sis, OMG where the hell is mom ? We've lost her... I run to the door and noticed it would open.  Then as I pressed harder I could hear a faint voice saying,  'help me up' coming from the deck... I  run to the other door  with my sis on my heels...... we go around the house to the front and there lays mom snow covered ... on my deck against our door..  she's fallen and with the recent hip surgery, she couldn't get up...  Yes, we always think of mom when we hear that Life Alert commercal also.  The words I remember my sis asking is, Mom what are you doing down there in a tone like you would scold a kid.   My reply?  She's got run over by a freakin reindeer, what the hell do you THINK she's doing down there snow covered and nearly frozen...Now, help me get her up...We dust the snow off her, and drag her back in the house, thawing her out the best we could.  The next year, mom got the delux stuffed reindeer that played, Grandma Got Run Over By A Reindeer.  And  YES we play that song every year, as the prelude before we tell the  story of how Mom got run over by a Reindeer. .. making the story bigger each time we told it.  Mom would always laugh till tears ran down her face.... EVERYTIME !!!   Why am I rattling so much about this lame story?  Damn'd if I know.  BTW mark, we finally got that God Damn Tree put up last nite..  :)

1 comment:

Mark said...

Dan, you are an awesome storyteller. Thanks for sharing. Now, if you could just get our blog to looking a little better. A title would be great at the top of the page. And maybe some colored fonts? FIX IT!!!