It's not Christmas 'til someone makes you cry

There's no dramamonger like a familial dramamonger and there's no time like the holidays for said familial dramamonger (FDM) to just take complete leave of their senses and start spewing all sorts of nonsense everywhichway, during their annual War On Functional Interpersonal Relationships.

Of course I let myself get sucked into it today because apparently learning from mistakes is for chumps. Had I been smart --which sadly I am not-- I would have said to the FDM that I just did not have time to deal with their special extra-robust houseblend of dysfunction today. I should have taken a rain check and promised to listen to two hours of emotional blackmail, inappropriate acting-out and the litany of Why You Ruin Everything some other time, when I didn't have to get up and talk in front of close to 2000 people.

Even as I was descending into the maelstrom of Crazy, I was just too tired to do it. I mean, this wasn't just regular Crazy, either. It was Holiday Crazy, which is like a super-concentrated, smokeable rock form of Crazy. It was Crazy that shook my very foundations of belief as to who these people are, what they value and how they think of me.

And yes, it hurt, and it's going to hurt some more before it's through, but tonight I'm going to fiddle dee dee. They're not going to ruin my Christmas. They're not going to make yet another holiday All About Them.

I hope.

In that vein and for your enjoyment I give you The Truest Secular Christmas Song Ever Written: Robert Earl Keen's "Merry Christmas From The Family"