A Holiday

Tonight is New Year's Eve, which is my absolute LEAST favorite holiday, because it's all about SOCIALIZING and having a "great" time, when really, there's nothing all that great about talking to shallow strangers at drinking parties in expensive hotel rooms, which is what most people think they need to do to have a great time on New Year's. There's also nothing great about being suckered into attending a drinking party at a near-stranger's house, which has been the story of my New Year's Eve for the last three years or so. All I remember doing at one of these parties is staring like a zombie at re-runs of "I Love the Eighties" on VH1 while drinking warm Coors Lights. At another, I fell asleep. At another, I became irrationally angry when our friend Ashley repeatedly and loudly insisted that we play charades, my absolute LEAST favorite game--so angry, in fact, that I yelled at her. When we finally wound up playing anyway, despite (or because of?) my evident hatred of the game, I became overly and embarrassingly competitive as an outlet for my aggression. I wrote down obscure, oddly worded book and film titles for the other team to act out; in revenge, someone gave me The Silmarillion. Luckily, Darren Belajac (another overly competitive player) was on my team and guessed it.

This year, I'll be going back to a near-stranger's (friend-of-a-friend's) house for a drinking party where games will be played. Seems like a cruel repetition of past New Year's nightmares, but this time, there are two differences: we're bringing our own supply of Jagermeister and Goldschlager, and I've changed my mind about games. They're pretty fun, especially when you have nothing more to talk about, which happens quite frequently to socially awkward people like myself. During my Mom and Grandma's five-day stay in Pittsburgh over Christmas, for instance, we played Skip-bo and Monopoly, thereby avoiding hours of awkward and meaningless chatter. Because who wants to discuss real-life with your family when you could be talking about purchasing the Pennsylvania Railroad or Park Place? Certainly not me.

Unfortunately, the dreaded real-life discussions do come up eventually. My mom started missing my dad when we sat down to eat Christmas dinner, and I spent a large part of the evening counseling her while trying to subvert my own emotions on the subject. Well, "emotions" probably isn't the right word; "chasm" might be better, because at this point "my dad" as a concept seems like a black hole that a large part of my life has gotten sucked into. But that is something that I can't exactly share with her, so instead I said "brave" and "upbeat" things that seemed to make her feel better--until she ran to the bathroom and projectile vomitted all over the wall. Really, that happened. My mom puked all over her in-laws' sterile, flower-papered bathroom on Christmas day. It was horrible...and totally awesome.

When I said good-bye to my mom and grandma, the closest remaining members of my family, a few days later, I felt guilty about being relieved. Even though I love them, and they are the only family I've got, my inner and outer life is very different than theirs, and I can refrain from impatience and even outright hostility for only so long. I know that most adults feel this way about their close family members, but I wish I could avoid it, given my peculiar family circumstances (being an only child and grandchild, and most of the family dead). This is why I've started liking games.

I'm going to go put on my "game face" for New Year's Eve now--and tuck a precious bottle of tasty liqueur under each arm. Here's hoping for even just a little bit of fun.