‘Wow, that was a great Christmas’ ~ December 26, 2002

David Heiller

The house was spotless for at least five minutes on Saturday morning. The great “Company's Coming” ritual was done: dusting, sweeping, mopping, cleaning, organizing, and many other little jobs.

I stopped to marvel. Our house never looks like this, and it really shouldn’t, because it would then belong to someone else and not Cindy and me.

Then company came.

Three more adults, three more kids, one more dog. Both entryways filled up with coats and boots and snow-pants. Cheese Nips and pistachios smothered the counters. Cookies, cookies, everywhere.

Lots of cookie, lots of food, lots of joy!
Claire and Therese.

A dog kennel went into the laundry room. Kids books took their place of honor on the coffee table. Games and playing cards lay on the dίning room table.

Soon a Christmas movie was playing on the living room TV, and music poured from the kitchen radio. Dogs barked. People barked.

Now we’re talking Christmas!

It happens every year, when Cindy’s brother and sister and their families stay with us at Christmas. We get ready for their big rush by bulldozing our old interior and constructing a new one. And like I said, we clean, clean, clean.

Then they arrive and the new house soon looks like the old one, and then some. Neatness has no place at the holidays. It’s fine for a dinner and small talk, for a quick visit and a peck on the cheek. But in an extended family where everyone knows everyone else’s good habits and bad, the house soon looks like a huge, human salad bowl, and rightly so.

Full and busy at our house at Christmas.
Notice that my brother can still read a book?

It’s the ultimate compliment when a person can relax at your house under such conditions.

I sometimes dream of a big house with spare rooms for everyone. What would that be like at the holidays? Probably great. But it somehow never happened for us, and I doubt that it ever will. So we all adjust to the smaller house and the clutter. We dodge the boots in the porch and dogs in the dining room, and we relax faster than it takes to think about relaxing.

It’s a temporary thing, and that probably, helps. No, we couldn’t live like this for an extended period of time. But we know in the back of our minds that order will soon return. And then when it does, when the songs have been sung and the house is quiet and the shelves are back to normal, when the lights are put away and the empty canning jars start returning to the top of the fridge, we always say, “Wow, that was a great Christmas.”

I hope the same can be said for you as you celebrate the holidays in your own way.

Happy New Year and thank you to all the readers of the Askov Amerίcan.