Begin Rant:
     First I couldn't go for a bike ride or surfing because of the weather (grr), so I decided to finish moving all the stuff from the condo. I couldn't find anyone to help me so I had to move all of Renee's stuff myself, then it starts to rain. It rains when I'm finishing up moving all of her important belongings.
     Oh wait did I say important? I meant old fire engine operating manuals, comic books, teen magazines, art class posters, wooden chests full of school books, "stuff", and her critically important collection of viewmaster toys. I completely filled the back of my truck with her shit and drove it up to my new place, storing it in the garage for when she comes back to get it. SO, once that was done, it was time for lunch.I went to my friend's work to go pick up lunch for him, and to chat for a while. The power goes out, and therefore we got cold food, and he had to close the shop early. (The power came back on 20 hours later).
     I went to go back and clean up the condo, and pick up the last few odds and ends, but it was too dark to do anything, so mission aborted. I still had to move Renee's motorcycle/scooter thing too, which, of course doesn't work and wieghs something like 200 lbs.
     The next morning, I picked up a few things at the house (no bike-ride/surf), cleaned the bathrooms, mopped the floors, and decided it was lunch time again, so I head to the bike shop where my friend works again. Unfortunately my truck doesn't like to pull sudden stops on a slippery downgrade and I hit some guy named Jaun with his 10 month old son in thier honda civic hatchback. I drive a Ford F150 full size pickup, and I don't need to explain that I did considerable damage to his car. I was driving down a hill, saw a bike that was waiting to cross the street, then notice his car was at a complete stop. I was going like 27mph and slide for 40 feet or so...blamo! The kid was ok but the guy had to be wheeled away in an ambulance; he had tears in his eyes from the pain in his back. (We wouldn't let him move until the ambulance got there.)
     SO, now it was time to head up to Dad's for "Christmas". This would normally be perceived as a fun event but in my case, it's not. Usually what happens is this; I show up, all of Merrill's family and some of her extended family are there already, and Dad doesn't have time to sit and talk about anything. I don't dislike Merrill's family, but I don't know them and it's not like Christmas. After dinner (which is the one thing I won't complain about), we open presents. Dad has a habit of buying nothing but "Joke" presents for us while Merril buys her family a whole shitload of cool stuff. I usually get some sort of cutsie trinket and a package of beef jerky. Gary, Merril's gandson, gets clothes. I stare at him and his new clothes with envy. I seriously wanted nothing at all if I couldn't use it in real life. I got $$$, two packages of beef jerky and a cow with a surfboard attached to his back. I wanted to leave the presents on the chair I was sitting in and get up and leave, but I didn't want to hurt Dad's feelings. I decided that if I kept one thing I had to keep them all, and since I will need $500 to pay for my car to get fixed, I might as well keep everything. He doesn't understand that I don't want trinkets, or money or beef jerky or a little penguin with a goldfish in his belly made out of venetian glass (from venice). I want Christmas to be fun, to mean something; I want him to talk to me about interesting stuff, what's going on in my life. He might know then that I want socks, or a new rear hub for my bicycle, or some new shirts...blah, blah blah. I guess I don't need anything from him. The only thing I REALLY need from him is to be proud of what I have done with my life recently, proud of his son. Well not proud of the car accident.
      I left, feeling empty and hurt because he doesn't know me.

     On my 2-hour drive back home, I kept thinking about all the pain the Jaun was in and the work he might have to take off. The neck brace he might wear right in time for Christmas. I kept thinking about the tears running down his cheeks because of pain, all he could think about was his son. He kept asking if his son was ok. He couldn't turn his head to see that this son was crying, unharmed. He wasn't worried about himself, he was worried that his son was not in pain.
     My Dad still cares about me, but not enough to know not to give me a ceramic "classic woody" station wagon ornament. I don't even have a Christmas tree. I don't know what he thinks because I can't ever really talk to him about it. What a miserable time of year.
     Maybe not as never racking as yours, but That was my Christmas.

(Update: Juan and his son are okay. Juan does not even have to wear a neckbrace.)