I live for the holiday season. It's not just the presents, giving and receiving, the massive amounts of turkey that send me into a triptophan-induced coma, or the pine needles that get stuck in my cats' paws. It's.well, all of that and more. It's the way snow brings the scent of fireplaces that swirl inside my nostrils. It's the sweet sting of December mornings crowding my head. It's scraping my windshield and warming up the car to drive past the fence my mother has drizzled with holly and wreathes. It's the people you know with light in their eyes as crystalline as the lights on the Christmas tree, and it's the people you don't know who wish everyone the best. It's Mannheim Steamroller's renditions of Germanic carols drowning out the hustle-bustle- brouhaha of Valley View Mall, drowning out business as usual. It's the stark love of Jesus Christ conquering our hearts, if only for a little while, as love should every day of our lives. This should not be a Christian time alone; no, it should be a human time.

My Christmas traditions? I wade through exams pining for the freezing time where I trek from my dorm room to my car, arm loads of luggage Mom wants me to bring home staggering my walk. I smile profoundly as the student body begins to unite, even in this sense, all going to the same place, to celebrate the same days and sing the same carols and drink the same egg nog. I don't care much for egg nog, actually; I'm more of a Russian tea kind of man. When I get home I absorb myself with chores, helping to decorate the house. This Christmas season will be very special for my family is exhibiting our home on Botetourt County's home tour, showing off our antique Christmas decorations against a backdrop of painstaking contemporary interior design.

Christmas Eve day is filled with power and anticipation. Uncle Marc drives up from Winston-Salem to our home. I really value my uncle coming up every year as he has for the past fifteen years or so; my family grows small as the years go by. My father's brother died when I was 13, and my father's rapidly-aging parents are the only grandparents I have. This season we will be taking him to Williamsburg the day after Christmas for a few days. A vacation during my vacation will be a first for me-I see it as a time to experience the season elsewhere. Also, because of the large chunk of time this outing will take, I have no real reason to work for a measly wage for a few days.

On this night my family drives a few miles to Fincastle to have dinner with our best friends, Sally, Harold, and Elizabeth Eads. My mother was one of Sally's western civilization students at Virginia Western Community College and they became friends instantly. Dad and Harold exchange stories with such hilarity that I think they will one day be featured on "A Prairie Home Companion." Uncle Marc downs one Guinness after another, and I swear the man never ever gets impaired. Elizabeth, my spiritual sister, is one of the smartest and most talkative people I know, and she tells me horror stories from her Anthropology classes. Somehow it wouldn't be Christmas without Elizabeth. My sister Katie and I just sit and listen to her sometimes. Elizabeth is so smart for her mere 21 years, and she has so much to say. I could easily visit other families on Christmas Eve, but, without the profound motherness of Sally, the fireside storytelling of Harold, the premature wisdom of Elizabeth and the yapping jaws of their dog Scooter I couldn't enjoy myself as much.

It used to be that my sister and I would open one present apiece on Christmas Eve. When my spoil-your-niece-and-nephew uncle is around it would turn out to be about seven apiece but as of late Katie and I just sit around, listen to carols and eat fudge. Katie tells me about school, how her friends are, and what useless gossip I have missed out on being away from Buchanan, Virginia. It's a quaint time for her and me, but it is time nonetheless. I won't be seeing much of her after this school year. I'll be working full time over the summer and so will Katie, and then she is headed off for school, most likely UNC Wilmington or Coastal Carolina University. She wants to study whales. Our Christmas tree is appropriately decorated with whale ornaments for her, not to mention cat ornaments, and a series of antique cars for me. My family sets up the tree the first weekend of December, and Mom has already bought one ornament each for my sister and I. We open it eagerly, like schoolchildren, and hang it on the tree as we would finger paintings on the refrigerator over a decade ago.

Christmas morning officially commences when everyone is awake. My sister and I are usually told to stay upstairs while Mom and Dad get stuff together and set up the fireplace, but the past two Christmases it's been "come downstairs when you feel like it." Presents take at least seven hours. We don't dive into them, ripping things open in a matter of five minutes. Granted there is a lot of stuff under that tree, but we like to make this part of the holiday last as long as we can. I used to get a lot of clothing but now I get money to buy my own clothes. I normally get music, movies, camera equipment, and other little trinkets. My dad gets a lot of books but more importantly he grins ear to ear when he gets a nifty piece of hardware. My mother gets many precious things, and it's hard to make a list of them for her tastes are huge. My sister gets a lot of bath and body stuff, music, and assorted things for her room. Uncle Marc gets all the things he doesn't have at home. We're almost his version of Home Depot but he doesn't have to pay for anything.

Christmas Day consists of us playing with all our new stuff. I normally retreat to my room and listen to new music and put things away that I won't be taking back to school. Dad and Mom putter around the house, and Uncle Marc reads the newspaper. This'll last for a few hours until the Eads and whoever else we may invite come over for dinner. Lasagna. How I love my mother's laaaaaasssssaaaaaaaagnaaaaaaaa! She'll also create a tremendous antipasto salad filled with ripe lettuce, jalapenos, salami, cheese, tomatoes, cabbage, carrots...you name it, my mother has it in the salad. It's truly a flavor explosion. I could call it Dynamite Salad if I wanted to...those jalapenos aren't tame at all. I guess that's why I eat so many of them. After the meal we exchange gifts once again, and then we all pose in front of the tree while I take a picture with my camera. Everyone goes home in the most jovial of spirits and sleeps well.