Nightmare On My Street...But No Caroling....

So much to write, so little time...

This past weekend was awesome in so many ways, but incredibly weird, too. Friday my girl Em invited me to a Christmas party with a bunch of women I didn't think I'd know. Turns out, I was wrong; I knew a few others who I've met through the years and it turned out to be loads of fun. I was the only one there not drinking or eating the soft cheese, so that blew, but otherwise, my hard-cheese-and-crackers-and-glass-of-ice-water was a nice accompaniment to fun conversation and a raucous gift exchange toward the end. I ended with a CD of highlights from Tchaikovsky's "The Nutcracker" which, while appropriate for the season, will also be a nice bedtime theme for the baby when it comes. The part about Friday, though, that got me the most psyched, was the fact that these women get together once a month for socializing, networking, etc. I didn't know that people did these types of things anymore, in the high-tech, low-contact world we live in today. I am happy to know that there are more ladies out there for me to meet. Wow, that sounded borderline lesbian. Well, I'll just go with it.

Saturday was a little more weird. My neighbor, Mrs. G., invited me to her great-granddaughter's "Quincinera", aka "Sweet 15th party." However, "party" is putting it lightly. This was an extravaganza! Ne'er would I have imagined the amount of money (the girl of honor's dress cost $700), time (they've been practicing for it since August) and effort that would go into a birthday party. But I guess this is a Mexican tradition, and it's supposed to be this big and extravagant. The birthday girl had a church ceremony, a huge reception and then all-night dancing afterward. For all intents and purposes, it was a wedding sans the groom. I'm not even kidding. She had a whole entourage of girls (around 8 of them, I think?) and escorts to accompany each of them. The were mostly kids from her school, and they were dudded up in bridesmaid's dresses and rented tuxes. It was quite the sight to see. When I asked Mrs. G. about the cost of the event, she said that the parents don't pay for it all; instead, they get "sponsors"--relatives, people from the church, friends from the community--to agree to pay for different parts of the event. That way, the parents are only responsible for the food and any item that is left over. I guess that's the way that weddings work, too. I found that hard to believe. But, I guess if Starr Jones could get sponsors for her wedding, why can't the rest of us?

Switching gears...One of my girlfriends once told me that when she was pregnant, she experienced very visceral, extremely erotic dreams that left her falling out of her bed night after night. She said, "Girl, this part of pregnancy is GOOD." Well, I have the visceral, falling-out-of-bed part down, but my dreams are actually on par with nightmares. For the past two nights, I have woken up in tears, thinking that someone is in my house waiting to kill me. Last night, I dreamt that I was being attacked by a wild animal and when I woke up at 4:30am, I waited the 30 minutes till I knew Adam would be waking up and called him, half-crying. Poor Ads was woken up simultaneously by his cell phone alarm and hotel wake-up call at the same time I called him in tears. He picked up, still groggy, with alarms going off in the background to say, "Heh-woh??" I told him to go shut off his alarms. When he came back to me, I said with the aching pangs of fear and loneliness, "I had another bad dream and I'm really scared." I think it took a few seconds for it to process through his sleepiness. "You did?" he replied. "Yeah, another one," I reminded him. The dream the night before had me in the middle of a murder-mystery movie (narrated creepily by Morgan Freeman) where I was the target of a psychopathic murderer in 1940s New York City. When I wasn't actually in the movie, I could see myself being portrayed rather convincingly by Keri Russell, of "Felicity" fame. Yea, I know, it doesn't add up. But, boy that guy, Mr. Paora (aka 'the killer') was really scary. When I woke up from that dream, I was sure it was a sign, a message from the great beyond that someone was waiting in my house to kill me. I sat in bed, shaking, looking for the slightest movement of a shadow. Gregory House loyally stayed in bed next to me, until the moment that I had to go pee, and I walked cautiously and watchfully through the darkened house. After going back to bed, I begged for the light of day to come so that my fear would go away. Somewhere during this time I fell back into a fitful sleep, and in the morning light, it all seemed ridiculous. But then with dream #2 full of wild grizzlies and bulls chomping at the bit (which was me), I lost sight of reality all over again.

Yesterday evening, I went to some friends' house for dinner. Right after dinner, the doorbell rang, and the husband breathed, "the neighbors." I didn't know what that meant until I heard the singing. The folks (and dogs) in their neighborhood had gotten together to go caroling from one house to another. They sang "Deck the Halls" to us and it was fabulous. I've never been caroled to before and I loved it. All I could think during the entire show was, "This SO wouldn't happen in our neighborhood!" It made me sad that we don't live in the type of community that would even think of doing something so light-hearted and sweet. On second thought, I'm sad for all poor neighborhoods that don't get exposed to simple pleasures like holiday songs on their doorstep. Something has got to change.

To all of you who don't get a holiday jingle, here's one for you

Fa La-la-la-la la-la, la, la