The Craptastics

Rereading my posts, I notice that I use the word “festive” a lot.

On Sunday my mother expressed unease at being depicted in one of these stories, so I thought the bagel-fight story was in order.

One Christmas Eve a few years ago, my siblings were performing at some church Christmas concert, so only my mother and I were home.  I don’t recall my father’s whereabouts, but they’re not important to the story so… he was participating in his yearly climb of Mt. Everest.

Preparing for an evening of listening to the radio and staring at the tree, mom and I were in the kitchen making tea and toasting bagels.  I grabbed a knife from the drawer, but it turned out to be a little dull as the bagel tore into doughy chunks.  I laughed so mom looked over and then berated me for using a butter knife to slice a bagel.  Of course, her fear of knives precluded us from having anything sharper than a rolling pin in the house, but that’s beside the point.  I told her that I would eat the decimated bagel, but she continued her gentle rebuke so I tossed both bagels and knife into the garbage and said, “Merry Christmas.”

Of course, she later brought both tea and a bagel to my room to compound the yuletide guilt.

For my mom, my brother, and me, our tempers go from cheerful to livid in a blink.