Griswald's Christmas Vacation (HoL12)

Continued from Eleven.

We left Disney and drove about 40 minutes down I-4 to Winter Haven to visit my sister Alison, her husband Ryan, and her two little Munchkins, Elijah and Lillian. Lily is a very busy little girl who will turn two in February. This was the first time I got to meet Eli who is five months older than Isaac, and about three feet taller. Eli and Isaac pretty much just sat around being cute, while Lilly kept herself busy by doing very mom-like things like putting her dolls in Isaac’s empty car seat and trying to figure out how she could affix an orange construction paper star to my shirt. The grown ups staid up late talking and drinking wine, and the kids all slept peacefully.

The next morning, while Ryan was at work, Nancy, Ali, and I rounded up all the kids to go to the public library to see Santa Claus. I had to chuckle thinking about how less than five years ago, whenever we got together there were wild parties and now we are wrangling three kids into an S.U.V. to go see the librarian’s retired husband sweating his ass off in a red fur suit and then eat some Goldfish crackers. Going to see Santa with the kids turned out to be a lot more fulfilling than the parties ever were. Oddly enough, the chances of seeing someone projectile vomit at either event were about the same.

Eli and Isaac didn’t care one way or the other about the fat man in the red suit. Lily on the other hand was not a huge Santa fan. She warmed to him somewhat when he gave her a small wooden goat I’m sure he had made in his workshop. She looked at him with a mixture of caution and pity, as if to convey the sense of “Well here is this Santa Claus we’ve been talking about since October. If he is so great, and can make any toy in the world, then why the hell did I get a wooden goat?”

We took many cool pictures with Santa, and then went out to “The Barn” for lunch. We ate out on the porch overlooking a pond. One of my top five moments of the whole trip was walking out with Lily on to the dock and holding her up so she could feed the fish. She thought the turtles were funny, but the funniest thing she ever saw was when fish would snap at the “Tiger Paw” cereal floating on the water and make a splash. She would laugh out loud whenever a splash surprised her.

We finished our lunch with peppermint cake, and said our goodbyes. Nancy, Isaac and I drove to Orlando to do some shopping and go visit my Dad’s mother, Granny. We sat and visited for a while. I always feel loved whenever I’m around Granny. She had quite a few of the pictures and stories I had e-mailed printed out and sorted on a table in the family room. It made me very proud. As far as I know, Granny was the only person who knew immediately that the word “Laughter” in the title of these e-mails referred to Isaac. My aunt Bobbi made us all dinner and we sat at the table and shared a meal. As we were eating, I realized that Isaac was the fifth generation to sit at that table, and I felt a real connection to the history of our family.

That night we drove back to Gainesville and crashed at my in-laws house. It was good to once again have separate rooms for Nancy and I and the boy. My parents babysat for us while I went and had dinner with my buddy Tonto, and Nancy went and saw Pride and Prejudice with her mom(I couldn’t stand it…..too much “pride”, not enough “prejudice”). Tonto and I had been friends since we were roommates for a summer at Camp Crystal lake. We would stay up late at night doing Simpson’s imitations, and coming up with devilish ways to scare our campers. He and his wife Shannon have three cute, clever kids. Tonto once told me, “You know I don’t know if I’ll ever know my purpose in life, but fatherhood…..that’s gotta be pretty close to whatever it is I’m supposed to be doing.”

Tonto called it a night early, and I went to my folks house to hang out for a while. They gave Nancy and I a very cool Christmas present. Mom handed me an envelope with three slips of paper. Two of the slips were tickets to Universal Studios and Islands of Adventure. The third slip was good for one day of babysitting from Gammy and G-Daddy (My father’s preferred grandpa name. I like it. It sounds like he’s a rapper.)

Our last day in Florida was mostly for resting. We had coffee with an old friend and my former Jedi master “Miss O”. I will tell one story about Miss O to let you know how much influence she had in forming my personality. The first time I met her, I was in first grade. My friend, Randy, was in her class. I was not. Randy had to go by her class to pick something up, and I tagged along. Miss O noticed that for the first time ever, Randy had come to the class room with his hands clean and his shoes tied at the same time, and for this he got to pick something out of the “Prize Box”. I too got to pick something out of the “Prize Box” for being there during that momentous occasion. I still have the prize: a fetal pig heart floating in an olive jar filled with formaldehyde. That one moment taught me a lot about showing grace to a stranger, and delighting in the bizarre.

Miss O shared with us some really clever parenting tips and treated us to Starbucks. I’ll share two of her tips. 1) Every year, save every scrap of paper your child brings home in a big file. At the end of the year, go through the papers with the child and pick out 20 important ones to save. Throw the rest away. 2) When going on a car trip, figure out how much spending money you would give your kids, and give it to them in quarters before you leave. Charge them 25 cents each time they whine or ask “When are we going to get there?”

On our last night, we opened a couple more presents and played with our nieces. Cassidy helped me put together some of Isaac’s toys, and Faith roughhoused with my mother-in-law. It was great to see our families and friends, but we are all happy to be home. Thanks for all the presents and hugs and kind words and time and warm places to sleep and meals and laughing. Merry Christmas.

Strength and Honor

Matthew Cravey