Home for the Holidays: Day 6

After getting up and assembling my "light," which took some doing (and which will take some undoing as I've got to pack it up in the morning to come home, glorious home), my best childhood friend arrived with her two-year-old. I know I'm supposed to think he's wonderful and appreciate his fabulosity, but all I can think is, Thank the Lord it's not mine.

Seriously. I'm extremely fond of some children, but I think actually having one would be the death of me. They're loud, they smell, and you have to act as though something that was cute the first time is cute the eighteenth time as well. They stayed for lunch and after, and finally left only as everybody was getting on coats for the family movie, which was Eragon. Not bad, really, though it scared the kids.

But then we came racing home, and the kids got nutty pretty quickly, and I realized quite fast that I needed to leave at once before I said something awful to someone who didn't really deserve it. So I headed to Borders with a gift card and realized that I wanted to kill most of the people there as well, particularly the people with small children who allowed them to shriek at-will. Bookstores should be somewhat sacrosanct - no shrieking allowed. I came pretty close to telling a complete stranger to take his fucking kid outside if she was going to keep making such a ruckus, but I kept myself in check.

Soon I will carefully pack away my things and start counting down the hours til my flight leaves from Baltimore tomorrow. And I'll be home, sweet home.

8:16 P.M.: An interesting final evening at "home." I allowed my sister to give me a haircut with a pair of paper-cutting scissors (I suggested pinking shears, but she wouldn't go for it) while using my mother's black nail polish to paint my toenails. Turns out she had to buy black nail polish to paint some buttons on a dress. "Otherwise, I'd let you take it," she told me. They have yet to notice my cartilage piercing. Or at least to mention it. A year or so ago, they would have had a cardiac arrest.

Something weird's going on around here, and I can't quite put my finger on it. Surely it's not acceptance on any level. Maybe they've just given up. Poor sods. The next ten years are going to be one rocky ride.

Claudia Hunter is the Beachwood's pseudononymous holiday affairs correspondent. She is reporting from the homefront in Central Pennsylvania. Previously:

* Home for the Holidays: The Preamble
* Home for the Holidays: Day 1
* Home for the Holidays: Day 2
* Home for the Holidays: Day 3
* Home for the Holidays: Day 4 (Christmas Eve)
* Home for the Holidays: Day 5 (Christmas)