...while wondering what ever happened to Burl Ives

So we'd reluctantly go to bed around 8:00 or so. Craziness. How in the hell they expected us to fall asleep is beyond me. Joseph and I would huddle up in our room, plotting and planning, as Maryellen was relegated to her room in the back of the house. Eventually we would fall asleep though and without exception -- probably owing to my being the youngest -- I would pop out of bed at around 6am, chomping at the bit.

Joseph is five years my senior, so as the years added up and he gradually came to know what the deal was, he became harder to awaken on those cold mornings. He'd beat me up if I even thought about waking him up before seven, so I'd sit there in the dark...waiting...wondering.

4850 N. Lawrence Street is a row house in the Olney* section of Philadelphia. Built sometime in the '30's, it was a brick rectangle, (more of an elongated L, actually), two stories high, about 12 feet wide and maybe four or five times as long. A square living room in front, followed by a square dining room and a kitchen minus three feet on the left, making room for windows on that side of the house. What you're left with is one rear-facing window in the dining room and three in the kitchen facing the side. Another kitchen window faced the modest (and concrete) back yard, next to the back door. The stairs were in the living room, on the right side.

Upstairs, my mom and dad had the "master" bedroom, which took up the width of the house and connected to my brother's and my room, which was about the same size, with the exception of the room needed for the stairs and hall. Our room, like the dining room below it, had a rear-facing window. Lying in bed, I could hear the busses a block over on 5th Street. Down the hall from our room was the bathroom, followed by my sister's. Below, a basement, dank and scary as hell, ran the length of the house. Identical to all but a handful of the other 51 homes on our block, it was nothing special, but it was home. The home I spent the first fourteen years of my life. Where I took my first steps. Where I discovered masturbation and Billy Joel (not at the same time). And where, on a spring evening in 1982, I sat at the dinner table, smiling like a simpleton, having that afternoon shared my first kiss in an alley off of Ashdale Street, with Jennifer Flynn.

So I would sit at the window, suffering through the longest hour of my life, waiting for 7:00. At the moment the numbers flipped over to read '7, 0' and '0' I would pounce. "Joseph!, Joseph! Wake up! Wake up!" After the initial sluggishness and obligatory smack or two, he too would begin to get excited and the countdown would begin. Eventually Maryellen would make her way down the hall into the room and it would become a full-on vigil.

At around quarter of eight I would try to pull a fast one, hoping I could get the parents up a little earlier than the Edict allowed for. But these people were good. Nothing got past them. So I would dejectedly head back to the room and the three of us would go absolutely insane with anticipation until we heard the first rumblings from our parents' room. Then they would emerge. Why were they always so tired on these days? I mean, my dad got up and was off to work before we even got up, usually and mom was awake and doing her thing around the house, getting us ready for school and whatnot on a regular day. What was so different here?

The waiting party would move out into the hall, where we'd jostle for position at the top of the stairs while Daddy went down to make his coffee, Mommy turned the thermostat up and they would turn on all the lights and fire up the stereo for some mood music. Then things got ugly. Who got to go first? Invariably I would end up winning, because I was the youngest. Like that millisecond would really make a difference. But we were kids. That millisecond was everything. So, with a, "C'mon down!" , mom and dad would release the hounds.

As we tumbled down the stairs, frantically looking for, "our pile", our necks would crane and our eyes scan the dining room, seeking out those treasured boxes, so full of wonder, so packed with promise. It was the epitome of joy. A joy we spend our whole lives trying to recapture, that of knowing with absolute certainty that something wonderful awaits.

My parents always made Christmas an incredible experience for us, and not by showering us with an obscenity of gifts, though we did do well in our hauls. No, what I take away most clearly from those mornings is the knowledge that I was truly loved. That my parents shared in our joy. That no matter how tired he was, my dad would perform any "partial assembly required", and then both my parents would play with us all day, and miraculously make all three of us feel equally paid-attention to. We'd go to mass, but the lesson had already been learned. We knew the true meaning of the day.

In the afternoon, we would head down the East River Drive, to Aunt Sue's house in the Fairmount section, to eat and show her our "favorite" present, (roughly translated as that which will fit in the car, make no noise and keep us out of the adults' way for a while). At the end of the day, I'd climb into bed. I'd drift to sleep on a soundtrack of tinkling radiators and SEPTA busses, winos at the bar on 5th and sleep-talk from my brother. And I would smile. Because I was loved. By my parents, my Aunt, my siblings and, most of all, by God.

May you feel the love, peace and contentment of Christmas tonight, in whatever form it finds you.

Paz.


* Picture taken in June, 1969, two months prior to my birth. It looks north on Fifth Street from the overpass just south of Somerville Avenue, about five blocks from the house I grew up in.