It was not until I was in college that I really started to realize that there were people other than my family who I still wanted to see over Christmas. Maybe this was because for the first time I knew people whose primary residence was not Greensboro, North Carolina. When my friends went home for Christmas, I felt a little lost.
Those of us who stayed in Greensboro for the break (I did so because I lived there), we’d compensate by doing things like opening the campus radio station for the day, and making road trips to see the people we missed.
When I moved to Charlotte, going home for the holidays was an easy day trip. I could be in and out in 36 hours or less. More time was not really required because I was able to come home once a month or so.
Then came the move to San Francisco. I spent my first four Christmases on the west coast, due to the logistics and economics of the trip. I visited at other times, but never made the holiday trek. And I was never really bothered by this, although I’m sure my parents were disappointed.
Here, I had my friends and my bars and my alleys. I was never alone for the holidays except once in 1994, after I’d just broken up with my longest-term boyfriend.
Last year, though, having just become unemployed by choice, I made the trip home on Christmas Eve. The plane was crowded, every passenger looked as if they were going off to war, and the movie sucked. Once I got home, it was a nice visit and all, but I’d just as soon have made it at a less insane time of year.
So it looks like I’ll be going home again this year, thanks to a family friend who works for USAir. I’ll fight my way onto a crowded plane at an unusual time of day, since we “freebie travelers” have to take what we can get, spacewise. I’ll arrive in the cold of North Carolina, be glad to see my parents and friends, eat lots of food, gain still more gut, and have a thoroughly nice time.
But I’d still just as soon do it some other time of year.
