"At least you won't be bailing the sewer!"

Growing up as a missionary kid (MK), Christmas was quite different for my family. We melded some of our North American traditions like gifts on Christmas morning (rather than on Jan 6, Kings day) with some of the Uruguayan traditions, such as doing fireworks at midnight on Christmas Eve. Christmas looked and felt quite different in the middle of summer in the southern hemisphere. Often times, we had visitors at or around Christmas time, one of whom, my Aunt Ann, would bring everything you could possibly imagine for us! She would humor my grandmother and carry on stuffed animals, pack Martinelli's, bagels, chocolate and other baking goods along with her own assortment of fabulous gifts for us. Because cold cereal was basically unheard of where we lived, a common gift under the tree was Cheerios or some other kind of cereal someone brought or my mom managed to get a hold of. Needless to say, Christmas was very different but we loved it.

Well, I should say we loved all but one of our Christmases growing up. The first year my sister had moved back to the US to go to college was already going to be a difficult one for us. We had never been apart on Christmas. It also just so happened to be one of the few Christmases we did not have any visitors come. We all struggled with feeling a bit lost and tried to keep hold of what we were really celebrating. We did our Christmas Eve asado (barbque), did the fireworks, got to open one present at midnight and off to bed we went. The next morning we had a fairly subdued morning until we smelled something AWFUL. My dad went to investigate in the garage and came back with the most depressing, disgusting news....the "poso negro" aka sewer hole in our garage had backed up and was going to have to be bailed by hand!

We proceeded to spent the next several hours bailing the sewer and then cleaning and trying desperately to get rid of the sickening smell that had permeated EVERYTHING!!!! I don't even remember what the rest of the day was like after that. My mom and I came to the conclusion that we must have repressed the rest of the memories because it was so pathetic.

This past week I was talking to my mom and feeling rather sad about the fact that this will be the second year we have not been able to go to Chicago to spend Christmas with my family. I've been trying to focus on the joy of the season and the new traditions I've been starting with my little family, but was still feeling a little down. In her infinite wisdom, my mom said, "Well, Julie, no matter how this Christmas turns out, it will never be worse than the year we bailed the sewer! At least you won't be bailing sewage on Christmas!" I had not thought about that Christmas in YEARS and had to laugh about the terrible, but now a little humorous memory!

My mom is absolutely right....I won't be bailing sewage this year. I will be celebrating our Savior's birth with my beautiful babies, my amazing husband and his family. If I keep my attitude in check, it should be a lovely, clean smelling Christmas!