I am a lady who takes many baths.  In fact, I am typing this from the bathtub this moment, trusty MacBook perched atop overfilled Ikea wastebasket, Star of David bedecked radiator humming and hissing and overheating the tiny bathroom.  My right knee is bleeding from a shaving cut.  My left leg is wound free, as I did not happen to shave that one.  I am not that big on shaving.  It’s boring.

All of this bathtub sitting allows for plenty of introspection.  In staring at my feet, I cannot help but notice that from certain angles, it very much resembles the foot of my mother. Mostly from the top.  Flat and wide.  From the side, it very much resembles my father’s. My father was born with a clubfoot, which I know very little about aside from it being a birth defect that involves a strange curvature of the foot, and, at least in my father’s case, a long childhood stint in a very large cast and a get out of Vietnam free card.  My somewhat southward navel gazing alerts me to my own curvaceous foot.  Age does manage to serve as a reminder that we are so much the product of our genetics.  

Christmas is always a difficult time of year for me.  Christmas Eve was the birthday of both my father and my maternal grandmother, and as such was usually a festive occasion. They died within ten months of each other, a decade ago now.  And yet, the absence of them on Christmas Eve is still pretty freshly felt.  My family still hasn’t really figured out what to do with this day, so no new tradition has ever been formed.  Not being a people too bent on traditions, anyway, I doubt one ever will be.

The holiday has really snuck up on me this year.  While I have not done much about presents aside from brokering deals with loved ones to forego exchanging them, I must admit that I have been enjoying the decorations plastered all over the Victorian houses in my quaint little neighborhood.  There’s a foot of snow on the ground and I’ve lost my favorite hat, but my affection for winter is ever increasing.  A woman remarked to me today how pleasantly warm it was, in the thirties!  I heartily agreed. Oh you, midwest. 

I am saving up some money to buy a car.  I feel like I should feel more guilty about my excitement for this impending purchase, but I do not.