If we were having coffee, we wouldn’t really be having coffee. We would be out to dinner after a busy family weekend. We are at *undisclosed* restaurant, and I’m having this cucumber cocktail that is so so so fucking good; it takes me back to St. Maarten. You’ve never even been to the islands, and after you sip it, you’re there, too.

How was your holiday? (In America, it was Thanksgiving.) Ours was good, but had a lot of people so was a little much. But then, Facebook’s memory feature showed me pictures of last Thanksgiving. I forgot this, but we couldn’t come home for Thanksgiving last year and I was really homesick. Remembering that made me more thankful for the hubbub.

If we were having cocktails, since Thanksgiving is over, though, now I can prepare for Christmas. I can listen to Christmas music, and since I have Wee One, I am thinking about Christmases of my childhood and how to make them feel as magical for her. Was there anything special you did? My mother and I (birth father was in and out) would celebrate St. Nicholas Day, December 6th, and so on St. Nicholas Eve, December 5th is when we would decorate.

We would have lay food out and eat on it all day: veggies and these meat/cream cheese/pickle rolls that I thought were the bee’s knees, and cookies and fudge. We would play Christmas music and put on the tree and put our little angels and the nativity and our stockings and doilies and everything up. It was such a special day, me and mom, having fun and reliving memories. Then, we would lay out shoes out by the fire place that night and the next day, have little gold coins in our shoes from St. Nicholas.

One year, when I was in undergrad, one of the girls who lived on my floor was German, and she put her shoes out in the hallway on St. Nicholas Eve. I knew why she did that, and I put treats in her shoes. She was tickled.

If we were having cocktails, I would tell you about how I want to give Wee One the same warm snuggly memories like I have. And of course, we will come up with our own things to do. For me, music is one of the strongest triggers, and I hope to create that for WO as well. You tell me about songs you like at Christmas, and then we talk about the ones we hate (Santa Baby, anyone? Or that George Michael or Mariah Carey caterwauling? Ugh.)

I have many a story related to music, and I promise to tell you all of them. Lucky you.