I'm upstairs waiting

I'm upstairs waiting for Christmas Eve to be over. Just waiting. Waiting for the week to be over really. I've been gone since Friday night, it's only Monday, I want to go home. I want to go home so bad that I doubt I will make it through the weekend. I had planned to - there were people I was going to hang out with, but I just want to go home. The family has left and my cousins that we are staying with are all downstairs drinking Belgian beer and playing cards. I just felt like being alone - like waiting it out up here alone. I don't spend this much time around people usually. I usually have a lot more time to myself, so I guess it's just getting to me - the constant interaction and conversation, the constant pretending. And, I feel like I'm eating way too much and I haven't been able to exercise at all, so I am starting to just feel gross.

The past couple of days of my holiday have been fine. There isn't much to report. I've been to some meetings, hung out with a few people, seen my dad a lot and spent a lot of time with my nephew. He's just so damn cute. Oh yeah, and did a little shopping for myself. I seem to have lost my Big Book which is a little disconcerting. I'm sure that I packed it. I never travel without it. And it's the one that I read with sponsors so it's all written in with the good/important stuff marked. Now granted it's not the end of the world if I don't find it. But where is it? Also, when I go out of town, I forget to pray. It's just not natural I guess when I'm not in my own house in my own routine.

So Christmas Eve is the day that my dad's family celebrates the holiday. They all came over to my cousins where we are staying and we did the usual. Which involves eating and opening presents, and for me, being uncomfortable. I know that my attitude is a choice and how I approach the situation is a choice - and well, I didn't have the best attitude going into this day and I'm not coming out of it much better either. I don't know if I want to go into the messy details of why this isn't where I wanted to be this Christmas Eve, and why I don't like it, and what is uncomfortable about it, or what is dysfunctional about my father's family or what happened in the past. But I've made an important decision - I'm not doing this to myself again. On many years I have said just that - I'm not doing this again. I know what it feels like for me to sit through these holidays and I don't like it. I just don't. I'm not doing it next year. The only reason I did it this year was to get to spend time with my brother and sister-in-law. Next year, we will have to find some other way to be together, or some other time to be together. Next year, for the holiday, if they come up here - I'll just go somewhere else - where I don't have to feel the way here for a holiday makes me feel. I feel something very specific, and I know what it is, and I could articulate it, but I don't feel like talking about it. Let's just say, it isn't worth it.

One nice thing did happen though (well, a couple of nice things, just one in particular that stands out) - my dad gave me a very beautiful antique bracelet for Christmas. I love jewelry - I wear different jewelry every day. I was expecting the usual (which isn't even necessary) - a check, written out right in front of me and not even necessarily put inside of a card. I always tell him, I don't need the money. This means much more to me than just getting a check. Granted he didn't execute on this gift himself - my brother and sister-in-law took him to the antique jeweler, but still - this is probably the most thought he has ever put into any gift he has ever given me. He even gave me a nice card. I wonder if he picked that out also. My dad knows that I'm unhappy. Not just because I told him when I told him why I don't drink anymore - but because he can tell I think. I think that he has always known, on some level, but denied it like he has managed to deny most of what happened during our childhood. Every time I do go to a family holiday, he always asks me what's wrong. It is obvious I guess that these situations bother me. I always lie and say nothing. He always says are you sure. I always say yes. He drops it. Anyway, the bracelet is beautiful. It makes me feel like crying.

Tomorrow we go over to my mom's for dinner. I don't know what to say about this. I am not looking forward to it. Everything about her and her life is sad and depressing, and weird. More on this later I guess.