As a child Christmas was an exciting event, but now as an adult it feels like a chore. Christmas has changed so much in recent years for me, that I don't look forward to it anymore. It's to commercial and people don't think about the real meaning of Christmas.
In the 1980's when I was a child , I couldn't wait for Christmas and all that goes along with it. Family was a very important part of the season. We had cousins, aunts, uncles, even people I never met that were related to us came over to my grandmother's house. I can remember watching the women making tamales, the men playing poker, and all of us kids messing around. The entire family would eat dinner together, obviously I sat at the kid table. Through out Christmas Eve, their was a lot of music playing ,laughter, and warmth. Once everyone ate and it started to get late, it was time to put the kids to bed. I would try really hard to go to bed, but I was so excited it was difficult. So I would stay up and try to listen to the adult conversations. Most of the times the adults talked about the gifts they bought for the kids. I still believed in Santa Claus, but I knew that parents bought gift as well. But every once in awhile someone would get up to go check on us and make sure we were all asleep. After trying to stay up for hours I would eventually fall asleep. The next day the kids were up by 6:00 a.m. sometimes even 5:30 a.m. An we would start to look for our gifts. I can remember shaking the boxes trying to figure out what was in them. And when you open it and find what you asked for, that was the best feeling in the world. I made huge messes with all the wrapping paper thrown all over. By the time my parent got up, I had new clothes on and would be playing with my new toys. I really miss Christmas past.
Christmas in the late 90's and the present is not as fun as it us to be. Now it's just my mother and I making tamales.
