someone help me

I don't know what is wrong with me, or what I was thinking, but I actually volunteered today to work on Thanksgiving.

Just in the morning, and for just five hours. But, still. . . . . Thanksgiving! This will be the first year that I miss the Macy's Day Parade, and you better believe I'm finding it very hard to keep myself from going to my dvr to record the whole event while I'm away.

Who does that? Seriously. Who records a freakin' parade to watch later in the day. Cause, you know, they kind of loose their appeal if they aren't watched live and stuff. At least for me. Being on the east coast, knowing that when Santa is coming down the street, he's REALLY coming down that street in New York City, and not already packed up and somewhere else.

Crazy. All of it. Even the fact that I still watch the damn parade in the first place. And, if that isn't bad enough, knowing that my favorite part is still seeing Santa, in his sleigh, waving at the crowd. Seeing him for the first time of the season, like a sign that everything has officially begun. I still get goose bumps. I think I get more excited over it than the kids do. In fact, I know I do.

But you know, it's all about tradition. I've watched that parade since I was a little girl, sitting on my daddy's lap, waiting, and waiting for Santa. Watching the same balloons march down the street, smelling my mom's cooking wafting from the kitchen, knowing that soon enough, I would see that jolly man in the red suit, and I would wave, like he was waving to me personally, when I saw him.

Yep, tradition. It's a grand old thing. And even if I can't be here this year to watch for the man in red, you better believe I will make sure Tim sits with the kids through it. And that I am here, at least by phone, for the moment that officially marks the Christmas season.

Because it just won't feel like Christmas if it happens any other way.