No more whining... Okay, maybe I lied.

Yaaaay! Christmas is overrr! I've decided. I don't hate Christmas. Actually, I *love* Christmas Eve AND Christmas Day! I just hate the month of December leading up to it.

Christmas Eve was great. I got up early, went and got breakfast, and chillaxed at the house until Jason got off of work at 12. He came over and he and my family exchanged gifts, and we just hung out aalllllll day and didn't do a dad-gum thing (with the exception of making the perfunctory Christmas stop at the liquor store) until it was time for stuff with his family that evening. We even got to take a nice long nap and would wake up in intervals to watch the Christmas claymation movie marathon on TV.

That night we met Jason's family and close friends for dinner at TGI Friday's, like we do every year. It was really nice! Afterwards we went to one of the family's houses for coffee and cordials until it was time for church. The service was beautiful! One of the associate pastors spoke, and it really rung true in my heart. It was about the meaning of the Christmas story and it was meant for people who had begun hating Christmas for various reasons. We also had communion, which was nice because I haven't taken communion in months. There was only one thing that might have been the fly in my proverbial glass of pink chardonay.

The girl that Jason wasn't allowed to date and was in love with anyway for about a year was there, causing a scene as usual. The thing was, her parents wouldn't let her date him because of their age difference (even though it was the same as ours) and because they didn't think he was "good enough" for her because he aspired to be a teacher rather than a business man. So they did the whole Hatfield-McCoy thing. Finally, almost a year later, he met me. Not only could I date him freely, but I wanted him to be whoever he wanted to be because I wanted the freedom to be whoever I was going to be. You can't put those expectations on people and expect them to let you be what you want in return. So it took about a week for him to leave her pompous, pretentious butt for me. (Seriously, it's like that Misery Business song. To prove my point, you can find the lyrics at the end of this entry.) Ever since then, she's had a hit out on me and done everything in her power to wiggle her way back in because she thinks that she can steal him back from me just as easily as I took him from her. She has instant messaged him regularly asking when he would be "through with me", when we broke up for a short period of time a few years ago she jumped in the very next day after we called it quits, she's stalked him on Facebook for well over 2 years. On Christmas Eve, she wasn't really in our faces because I was there, but she made sure to be in Jason's line of vision the WHOLE time. She would glare at him and walk back and forth in front of us as if she were on a very important mission. VERY important. Jason didn't even notice, but I couldn't help but laugh. How desperate and childish can you be? It was cute and caused serious drama when she was 18 and it was our first Christmas together, but almost 4 years into it and he hasn't even looked her way and it's just kind of desperate. I almost wonder if now it's not so much about Jason but about putting me in my place, that she was here first... Trying to show the world that Jason chose the wrong girl because she's better than me. But if that's the case, why would he have chosen a hot dog if he could have filet mignon? All I have to say about it is that the proof is in the pudding, and if I'm supposedly the "hot dog", I sure have lasted a long time... I must be one hell of a weiner.

Anyway, on to better and brighter things, Christmas Day was FABULOUS...ish. I got up with mom and sister on Christmas day and opened gifts, and spent the rest of the morning in a house with tension as thick as a knife. Mom was miserable, therefore we were ALL miserable. Her spoiled brat fiance was out of town with his kids, and he called her several times throughout the morning to complain about their bad attitudes, their good-for-nothing husbands, and his under-achieving siblings with alcohol dependencies. Of course, my larger-than-life mother with a messiah complex wanted him to come home so she could fix it (also because she was having a fit because he chose to go spend time with his children instead of staying in town for her). My sister was developing a stomach bug and missed my dad, so she spent most of the day holed up in her room watching the Project Runway marathon. My mom and I had static going between us the ENTIRE day. She did everything in her power to make me feel like crap after the initial gift swapping tradition (in retrospect I wonder... was she acting like that because I was actually enjoying my Christmas?). She sulked over lunch, was angry because I made sugar cookies, sulked because she wanted to watch the Lifetime channel and I didn't (it goes without saying that we watched the Lifetime channel. She acts like I'm the bad guy, but I don't even fight her on what she wants anymore). The only time she seemed happy and relieved was when I was heading off to Jason's for Christmas. Her behavior would make sense if I was pouting, sulking, and throwing fits (sound familiar?) but I literally just sat around with vaseline on my teeth and hot chocolate with a double shot of amaretto in my hand and internalized EVERYTHING. I can't even begin to believe how spoiled, tempermental, and childish she behaves. But analyzing her strange behavior is for another day, I just avoid her like the plague and go on with my life because I've spent the last 21 years of my life with a guilt complex because my mother has always acted like I was a horrible person and I could never figure out why (it has come down to this in my opinion: between my sister and I, I am the least like her and I don't let her manipulate me).

Jason's family Christmas was wonderful. It was all glowy and warm with my favorite people, and to me it is the epitome of what Christmas should be. Lots of people, lots of laughing, lots of food, lots of presents. I felt the love more this year than any other at their house, and I feel like I am finally a part of their family.