A cold December morning, a car filled with packages, people and pain. So little room that there is a pie between my feet in the back seat. All four of us kids are in the back seat, Dad and Mom sit in the front, the smell of last nights alcohol still seeping through their pores.

The car travels slowly up Grandpa’s ice covered mile and a half drive, as we approach the house we see the other relatives cars already having arrived. The car comes to a stop and we all start to exit the car, I bend to grab the pie and turn to shut the door. My footing is not secure and I slip precariously on the ice, the pie is lost from my grip and I watch as it falls to the ground as if in slow motion, my hands grasp to catch it just to save this one pie, but I fail.

“You’ve ruined my Christmas,” my mother wails “can’t you do anything right!” and she turns and walks up the sidewalk, never turning to see the despair in my eyes.

Happy Phqn X-Mas