For once, Christmas was pretty good. I haven't had that holiday feeling since I was little, when I used to be excited for gifts, for Christmas lights, trips down Peacock Lane, food, and for Santa (scratch that last one). I guess that all the holiday cheer that I used to have as a kid disappeared, because eventually we all grew older, we aren't particularly religious (and even if we were, we're in the wrong religion to celebrate Christmas). The last couple Christmases, we didn't even have a tree, just the exchange of presents, and usually that involved my mom running to her purse to grab some money to give us after we handed her and my dad our presents.

So I was expecting another underwhelming Christmas day; Another day with a forced big dinner at home, some quick exchange of presents, and then everyone doing their own thing. That all changed with a last minute call from my friend Hieu. He told me he had room in his car for one more, and that he was headed to Mt. Hood Meadows on Christmas Day, 6 AM. I called my sister and borrowed her boyfriend's gear (plus his season pass), and went to Hieu's to spend the night.

Christmas morning was great, after some breakfast, we headed to the slopes, for a nice snowy Christmas snowboarding. I fell, a LOT, but there was progress on my very last run down the mountain. That was pretty fun, followed by some food at Hieu's, before I headed home for what I thought would be an uneventful Christmas at home. I got home to a big dinner with just my intermediate family, which is what I expected. But finally we had some resemblance of Christmas in our house again; our plant in the corner had Christmas lights, which was a nice surprise. It was the spark I needed to feel the holidays again, and spark that feeling of family which had been lost since me and my sisters moved out of the house. We even sat back and watched a movie together as a family at home for the first time in several years (I'm talking like, literally over a decade). It would have been better if my oldest sister was able to come, but hopefully that'll be part of next year's Christmas. I'm hoping that this is how Christmas is like for the Tran family for years to come, because I missed having the Christmas spirit again.