Christmas Couch, Cioppino, Cracker (Nut) and Colon Cancer

My Christmas gift from a relative is a couch. Not exactly the gift of the Magi, but it reclines and is made of leather. I drove to El Dorado Hills to pick it up.  Took the seats out of the Sienna Saturday, and set out across the causeway.  Driving east from Davis reminds me of being on the moving sidewalk at an airport.  You know you’re moving because the billboards change but it seems to take forever.

Using a ladder to hold up the back door of the van because those little support things on the side don’t work, we crammed the couch into the family coach. I then headed down the hill with a leather loveseat stretching bow to stern. Bill Clinton and his Chevy El Camino.

On Saturday, as with most holiday season days, there were more holiday chores than holiday cheer. You can’t have Christmas cioppino without a few bottles of Sollini’s starter sauce and the only store selling the seafood-based, red delicious, in the tri-county area, was Vic’s IGA in Folsom.  At least that’s what the internet said.

I went to Vic’s a good five miles out of my way, one-way, and Sal, of all people, asked me what Cioppino was. Wow, what a disappointment to run into the only Italian in the grocery business without a shellfish background. A bigger buzz kill was the fact that Vic’s had no Sollini’s and I was facing Christmas dinner for thirty starting from scratch on the fish stew.

From Folsom back to Davis sans sauce and full of couch, I was mentally preparing for the (Nut)Cracker.  If you are one of the two thousand parents with kids in the Cracker you know that you blew through your yearly carbon budget in three weeks of practice and pre-show drop-offs. Don’t give me carpool or bike stories. You’ve been driving back and forth to Vets like a yo-yo since Thanksgiving because your kid is the next Rock-ett. Next thing you know you’ll be telling me you started a fire in the fireplace because the wind was blowing and nobody would notice.

Now with my co-pilot driving, we dropped our dancer at the early show and added a dog groom to the trip cutting our carbon footprint. Multi-choring is what we do best. We were on time for the matinee except for the unfortunate neighbor/couch episode.  She is such a nice person, our neighbor, that when she peered in the window and caught me sprawled on the couch with the dog and no ability to click-it or face ticket, she said nothing.  She’s very polite, but really, not even a question about why we have a couch filling up the van? What, does she think it’s always there or does she think we just roll that way for the holidays?

I either have her vote for life or am damned to eternity.

Matinee over, dog groomed and dancer home for an hour reprieve, I then start the madness all over again by taking Daddy-charge of the evening performance drop-off.  I beat the neighbors out of the hood with a fleeting thought of why didn’t I ask them to carpool, but heck their kids all have speaking parts and Broadway roles and I don’t want to upset their Chi. I reach the Vet to find an empty parking lot and the feeling that comes only when you screw up the times of a kid’s gig.  Being an hour early is almost worse then being an hour late. Do I stay or do I go now? Where are the neighbors?

There were a bunch of smart Mommies there.  Attorneys, school board members, a three time Olympic champion. But they were as wrong as our smart Mommy leader. At least I had the couch to fall back on, literally, while they scooted home. The neighbors never showed, must have been headed out to dinner. I should have asked for the carpool.

Another Cracker performance eventually began and fulfilled its promise of delight. The day of holiday chores and cheer then ended with word that my friend and colleague Eve’s colon cancer surgery went well.

It puts it all in perspective. Start from scratch on the stew, hug your dancers, and keep a couch in the van.  Say a prayer for her and have a Merry Christmas and/or happy holidays.

These and other photos from the 2009 Davis Children’s Nutcracker are available on the City of Davis website.