Gingerbread Men

Note
To self:
Don't walk,
To Starbucks,
In ballet flats and legwarmers,
Through mud,
Snow, and slush,
In a thin skirt and bitter cold,
Downtown,
Especially
When you've always hated coffee.

Hot chocolate does just as well. The partially-decorated Christmas tree is heavy on the front bottom section. My brother is taking a metal detector to his unopened Christmas presents. Cookie-Baking Day, the reason that the Ex-Guyfriend's mother never knew me as any more than "cookie girl", is Monday. Finals are over, as I remembered when I caught myself factoring differences of cubes in my head. Save that for when you're penned up in a pew Christmas morning.

Your friends won't ever hear your prayers for them. I love not being able to get from my locker to the cafeteria without being handed three different kinds of candy canes. No matter how much I aspire to have none, religion affects every part of my life. Just once every year, the least it can do is give me stuff.

In another sense, it's vacation. I've never actually had all three volume controls on my guitar amp all the way up simultaneously. I've got heaps of podcasts I haven't listened to. My closet floor is an explosion of ribbons and hangers. I'm going to fulfill a months-long urge to bake gingerbread men. (The recipe said "gingerbread people".) I'm going to listen to "Hung Up" two or fifteen more times, eat quesadillas, and watch The Return of the Jedi.

Cherish the things you love, right? I'd rather be walking under bright lights in a big city, but when my mouth tastes like egg nog and stollen I can't be quite so bitter.

Oh, when the sunshine beckons to ya,
And your wings begin to unfold,
The thoughts you bring and the songs you sing
Are gonna keep me from the cold
- Oasis, "She Is Love"