Saturday, December 24, 2005
Christmas Eve
At least six feet two, dark curly hair, big brown eyes, a sweet smile and a voice like a cello playing softly. No, not some JO fantasy--that had already happened--but a very early morning caller from my local plumber yesterday.
My garbage disposal jammed about a week ago. In trying to get it going again I'd pushed the reset button so hard that it popped into the disposal's metal case and was gone for good. I called the plumbing company, and we set up two possible days when I could stay home from MIT--the Friday before Christmas and Tuesday after New Years. When they hadn't confirmed by Thursday night, I assumed we were going with the later date.
So on Friday morning I'd just gained consciousness but wasn't completely awake. I absolutely love that state--the problems, upsets and unpleasantries of life don't yet register and I float in a wonderful place between the aftermath of dreams and the onset of erotica. The phone rang. It was six forty. I'm not the first blogger to note that calls in the middle of the night or very early morning usually mean a death or big problems in the family. So I get to the phone--naked, hard, dazed--and a cheery voice from the plumber's tells me my repair man will be at the house in ten to fifteen minutes.
I can move very fast when this sort of thing happens. By the time Strati arrived I was dressed (OK, commando, but at least I had pants on), had turned on the outside light, cleaned out the cabinet under the sink, washed last night's dishes and gotten them into the drainer, made my customary morning call to Fritz, gotten some hot tea into me, and was ready to meet the public.
Strati (there's a large Greek-American colony in Roslindale and they brought their bakeries with them!) broke a decades-old pattern for me that can be summed up with "Electricians hot, plumbers not." He was a doll, really sweet, cute and extremely personable. Repair was impossible--the inside of the disposal's case looked like a metal filing dump. So he did a new installation, collected two hundred and eighty six dollars--two days before Christmas, you understand--and when he was leaving he looked around and told me how beautiful my house is and how much he likes doing jobs amid such lovely surroundings. I melted. For a brief moment I thought about taking a sledge hammer to my bathroom sink and seeing if I could get him back later in the day on an emergency call, but I'm not THAT gay.
George Bush quote of the day:
"If we don't succeed, we run the risk of failure."
- George W. Bush
I'm thoroughly sick of this "national debate" on how we can't call it a "Christmas" tree, we have to call it a "Holiday" or "Magic" tree, etc. I believe completely in multiculturalism. When I was raising the girls we celebrated Christmas, lit a menorah, celebrated the Asian lunar New Year, did some Kwanzaa, some study of Islam, and they never tired of hearing about Odin and the other Aesir of Nordic mythology.
To me, multiculturalism means you accept and celebrate everybody's culture, not that you suppress a couple of random ones just to promote the others. Wholly unnecessary. And I'm an atheistic humanist anyway, so I could actually do without the lot of them, but what does it hurt to actually GET ALONG WITH PEOPLE? Radical concept, I know--it's just so much easier to hate. Sad.
So, to all of you who read me, Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, Seasons Greetings, Blessed Eid, Happy Holidays, Kwanzaa Furaha, Wondrous Solstice, Riotous Saturnalia, and a Happy, Healthy 2006. Whether I've had the pleasure of meeting you or not, I'm delighted you stop by DesignerBlog and particularly happy when you leave a comment. Love and hugs to you all and to your loved ones, whatever tradition enriches your lives.
My garbage disposal jammed about a week ago. In trying to get it going again I'd pushed the reset button so hard that it popped into the disposal's metal case and was gone for good. I called the plumbing company, and we set up two possible days when I could stay home from MIT--the Friday before Christmas and Tuesday after New Years. When they hadn't confirmed by Thursday night, I assumed we were going with the later date.
So on Friday morning I'd just gained consciousness but wasn't completely awake. I absolutely love that state--the problems, upsets and unpleasantries of life don't yet register and I float in a wonderful place between the aftermath of dreams and the onset of erotica. The phone rang. It was six forty. I'm not the first blogger to note that calls in the middle of the night or very early morning usually mean a death or big problems in the family. So I get to the phone--naked, hard, dazed--and a cheery voice from the plumber's tells me my repair man will be at the house in ten to fifteen minutes.
I can move very fast when this sort of thing happens. By the time Strati arrived I was dressed (OK, commando, but at least I had pants on), had turned on the outside light, cleaned out the cabinet under the sink, washed last night's dishes and gotten them into the drainer, made my customary morning call to Fritz, gotten some hot tea into me, and was ready to meet the public.
Strati (there's a large Greek-American colony in Roslindale and they brought their bakeries with them!) broke a decades-old pattern for me that can be summed up with "Electricians hot, plumbers not." He was a doll, really sweet, cute and extremely personable. Repair was impossible--the inside of the disposal's case looked like a metal filing dump. So he did a new installation, collected two hundred and eighty six dollars--two days before Christmas, you understand--and when he was leaving he looked around and told me how beautiful my house is and how much he likes doing jobs amid such lovely surroundings. I melted. For a brief moment I thought about taking a sledge hammer to my bathroom sink and seeing if I could get him back later in the day on an emergency call, but I'm not THAT gay.
George Bush quote of the day:
"If we don't succeed, we run the risk of failure."
- George W. Bush
I'm thoroughly sick of this "national debate" on how we can't call it a "Christmas" tree, we have to call it a "Holiday" or "Magic" tree, etc. I believe completely in multiculturalism. When I was raising the girls we celebrated Christmas, lit a menorah, celebrated the Asian lunar New Year, did some Kwanzaa, some study of Islam, and they never tired of hearing about Odin and the other Aesir of Nordic mythology.
To me, multiculturalism means you accept and celebrate everybody's culture, not that you suppress a couple of random ones just to promote the others. Wholly unnecessary. And I'm an atheistic humanist anyway, so I could actually do without the lot of them, but what does it hurt to actually GET ALONG WITH PEOPLE? Radical concept, I know--it's just so much easier to hate. Sad.
So, to all of you who read me, Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, Seasons Greetings, Blessed Eid, Happy Holidays, Kwanzaa Furaha, Wondrous Solstice, Riotous Saturnalia, and a Happy, Healthy 2006. Whether I've had the pleasure of meeting you or not, I'm delighted you stop by DesignerBlog and particularly happy when you leave a comment. Love and hugs to you all and to your loved ones, whatever tradition enriches your lives.
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My thanks to all of you for your good wishes and it goes without saying I return them in kind. For the record Christmas is here in Roslindale this year. Fritz came down from NH, and daughters came in from Colorado (with her wonderful husband) and New York City. Between bouts of cooking, I'm getting my ass whipped at BOTH Rummykub and Scrabble.
Love and hugs to you all!
Love and hugs to you all!
I must have missed the memo that redefined NOT succeeding as also NOT being failure.
Leave it to DUMBya to come up with something like that.
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Leave it to DUMBya to come up with something like that.
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