A Bracing Blast of Insanity!

I talked to a cousin on Christmas morning. What a bracing blast of insanity that turned out to be! Suffice it to say that I have nothing to do with my family of origin for a very good reason. I'd probably get drunk again.

But I can pray for them, and so I shall.

Christmas was wonderful. I called the 'Rents down in Ft. Myers, FL and we had a very nice chat for about 10 minutes. Then I called the remains of the family of origin (see: "Cousin", above), and that was scary. Then I hopped on the NJTurnpike and, along with about a bajillion other people who, apparently, all live in Boston but have relatives in Baltimore, headed south amongst the herd to have Christmas Day with my sister and her HUGE clan. I have grown up nieces now. And they have husbands and babies. It was noisy, and fun and loud and loving. I had a great time. The little ones are very leery of me. They can't quite wrap their brains around the fact that "MeeMaw" (my sister, their grandmother) has two brothers, and that I'm one of them.

But, by the end of the day, I'd won them over and they were crawling all over, and hanging from, me like I was the playground Monkey Bars.

For dinner we had both turkey AND 'Roast Beast' (to uphold Dr. Seuss's storyline). The adults did our "Secret Santa" thingie (I got two CD's and a DVD collection) and, by 8:30 p.m., everyone was heading home, full up, sated, satisfied and happy as clams.

I'm taking the week off, so yesterday I just went to the movies (saw "Dreamgirls" -- GO SEE IT NOW). Today was document shredding day (bank statements, medical stuff I won't use, etc.). I already made my annual trip with unused clothing to the Salvation Army. Tomorrow I'm spending the afternoon and evening with a friend of mine (divorced) and his 11 year old daughter - we're going to see "Happy Feet". Friday I'm doing Manhattan as a tourist and getting my hair cut with my old stylist, seeing the matinee of "The Drowsy Chaperone", having dinner with my college roommate and then, in the evening, seeing "The Little Dog Laughed."

(I'm getting exhausted just reading all this).

I have a doctor's appointment in there somewhere. Oh, and I'm going to a New Year's Eve party with a bunch of sober gay men which, with any luck, will turn nasty by midnight (just kidding -- we're sober now).

Have I told you how grateful I am lately? My life is more wonderful than I ever thought it would be ever again. Nine years ago I was sure that my life was over.

Boy, was I wrong. It turned out that God had "other plans" for me. I'm so glad that my plans didn't work out. But I shouldn't have been surprised.

My plans rarely worked out.