a very special Christmas Eve message

Posted by beth on December 24, 2008

Dearly Beloved,

We are gathered here today, on the eve of the day when we remember the birth of our Savior (not the day he was actually born, mind you, just the day the Europeans decided to allocate for this purpose to offset the pagan winter holidays going on around them), to talk about something most of us have probably done or had done to us this very day.

I am speaking, of course, about that moment when, whilst driving through town, you encounter a less-than-good driver, and when you finally get to pass said driver, you look at him or her. Or alternately, when another driver concludes that you are a bad driver, passes, and looks at you. It is not necessarily a dirty look, although that is certainly an option. There is usually no finger involved. And often, whether on the giving or receiving end of the look, you do not even stop singing along with the radio. It is just a look, but why do it?

Perhaps we want to see what kind of person drives so poorly. We take mental notes on the driver’s appearance so that we might avoid similar drivers in the future.

Maybe we want to see what they are doing in there, since driving is apparently not high on their priority list.

Or maybe we just enjoy that very brief moment of human contact. We are curious about other drivers the same way we’re curious about whether or not Jennifer Aniston is really growing a baby bump – not because we really care about her personally, but because we just like to know stuff about other people.

This is why we like to gossip so much, is it not? Because knowing things about other people either will hopefully make us feel better about ourselves, either because we conclude that we are better than someone else or that we are more normal knowing that they’re weird too.

Come to think of it, that’s probably why some of you read Onward Hoe!. And if that’s the case, and if it’s working, I’m glad I could help. I’m pretty weird for a number of reasons, so it would make sense that you would come to me to feel normal. In fact, here. Here’s a list of reasons why I’m probably weirder than you. Go and feel good about yourself. It’s my Christmas gift to you.

• Santa will be bringing me this coat for Christmas. I thought I might be the only one who would like it, but it’s fairly difficult to find either on the internet or in stores, so hey…maybe it’s not so weird after all. Oh wait. It is made by Jessica Simpson. That’s kind of weird.
• I’m selectively vegan. That ought to be plenty weird to cover all kinds of your weirdness.
• I have a Broadway soundtrack running through my mind almost constantly. And more than occasionally, the soundtrack will play aloud without warning either to myself or to those poor souls who are subjected to it.
• Last night, I dreamed that the skin on the bottom of my foot peeled off in one big footprint-shaped sheet that had a lovely, intricate, snowflakey sort of pattern to it. I kept it.
• Request, some time, to see my aerobic dance routine. Or maybe I’ll do a tutorial here. That’d be interesting.
• I made an earring out of a plastic matchbox car. Yes, just one. No, I don’t wear it. I’m not that weird.
• I secretly wish I could be on a step team.
• I see shapes not in clouds, but in the way my facial moisturizer squirts out of its bottle.
• I say “check” after nearly all completed things, even if they aren’t on a list…anywhere.
• I think about grammar almost as much as I think about Broadway and imagine myself starring in Thoroughly Modern Millie. That is, until I realize I’m too curvy to make a good flapper. No one should think about grammar that much. No one.
  
• I have a small obsession with Magnum, p.i.
• I have to leave the country once a year, or I feel dead inside.

Hmmmm…that seems a bit too depressing a note to end on. How about this? MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!!!!!