Julia

During my entry earlier this year for a year in Philadelphia things got a little away from me so to organize my thoughts I figured I’d break my days down into parts.

Christmas Eve

Morning

I work at a library in South Philadelphia but live in West Philadelphia. This seems like not that much of a commute and if you have a car, it's not. In fifteen minutes, I can cross over the Grays Ferry bridge and I’m basically there. But I don’t have a car, so I have to rely on public transportation and if you’ve ever ridden the 64 you know that certain bus lines are less reliably consistent than others. Normally, I would compensate for the inconsistency of Septa by getting to the stop early, but I have always been a late sleeper so with a Christmas themed murder mystery novel on audiobook blasting through my headphones I rushed to catch the bus.

It was a Christmas miracle that I arrived at work on time. Even if I hadn’t it was the morning before Christmas and everyone was a little lax about lateness anyway. I had called out the day before because I was exposed to covid over the weekend, and I wanted to be safe since I was feeling a little sick but to my relief it turned out to be allergies. I wore a mask and tested to be safe but I needed the hours so I couldn’t call out again.

(Me masked up and on the 64 on the way to work)

Afternoon

The weird thing about working for the city is that we often have early closures the day before the holiday. We get out at 1PM and are paid for a full day of work. The thing about my branch is that on Tuesday’s we don’t open til 11 so I literally only had to come in for two hours of work. Unfortunately, no one had picked up my essential duties the day before, so I was forced to cram two days of work into two hours. 

After hustling and bustling, I was able to leisurely head home and enjoy my day. On the bus home I texted my friend, Sarah, a happy birthday. We had celebrated the week before because it's sort of impossible to celebrate a birthday so close to Christmas, but I wanted to make sure they got a birthday text anyway. Sarah is also an incredible Philly based DJ who goes by _nyxwerk. Check 'em out!

When I got home, I had a lovely Christmas card from my good friend, Fee Pelz-Sharpe (Fee appeared in my August entry of A Year in Philly). I also had a package of books from my friend Gion Davis. It felt nice to get two packages from two people on Christmas Eve. You should check out both Gion’s and Fee’s poetry if you’re the kind of person who likes poetry. 

(Books from Gion and a Christmas Card from Fee)

Evening

Normally for Christmas Eve, I make the trek up to the far Northeast, the very edge of Philly, to visit my mom-mom and pop-pop and see my mom’s side of the family. A lot of us go to Christmas Eve mass at St. Katherine of Siena because my mom-mom is in the choir and very Catholic. I used to go to mass but don’t anymore. Then everyone goes back to her place for dinner, drinks, presents, and all that good Christmas cheer. We usually do a big deli spread, our stereotypical German tradition, and my aunts and grandmother drink too much whiskey, our stereotypical Irish tradition. The only years I’ve missed this tradition so far in my thirty-two years of living was during covid lockdown.

The thing is my mom-mom and pop-pop are getting up there in age and aren’t up to hosting this type of thing anymore. My mom did visit and asked us if we wanted to come but I didn’t feel quite comfortable visiting my grandparents after such a recent covid exposure even though I was testing twice a day, feeling fine, and the doctor I went to on Monday suspected it was just allergies. 

The other reason I didn’t go is because I’m used to having the whole extended family as a barrier between me and my grandparents. I used to be very close with them both but as I got older our politics diverged drastically and then I came out and they weren’t the most accepting of my queerness. We’re civil but it’s easier to be in their company when I’m surrounded by my aunts, uncles, cousins, and immediate family who all are accepting of me. 

So, this year, I stayed home since I didn’t want to risk them getting sick and there was no party to keep my politics and queerness at a safe distance from them. Instead, I finished my hundredth book of the year and called my partner, who was stuck home sick, and needed some company.

I went to bed around midnight after texting my friend, Christian, our yearly Christmas tradition.

(I really wanted to read a hundred books this year and this was my hundredth)

(One of favorite Christmas traditions that I won’t let a transphobe ruin)

Christmas Day

Morning 

The big day is here! Unsurprisingly, I woke up late but luckily so did my siblings who were supposed to drive me to my parent’s house. We had told my parents we would be there by 9AM and we got there at…11AM. This is normal for us as a family though the lateness varies for which one we’re talking about. My motto is “a Gwiazdowski is always early or late. We never arrive when we mean to.”

While I waited for my siblings to come pick me up, I saw that my brother, Grant, warned us that my mom was in a bad mood. She often gets like this when she has company, especially around the holidays. I know that she often calms down a bit when we talk on the phone, so I called her and we talked for a while and I noticed her mood shift a lot. I was happy to help.

My sister, Di, and my brother, Austin, scooped me from West Philly, as well as our good friend, Jesse, and his sibling, Sully, who were spending Christmas with us this year. Jesse Arbor is a dear friend of mine and a collaborator who illustrated my poetry book. You should check out his art. It’s amazing. He is one of many folks that we’ve adopted as an honorary sibling and this was his second-year spending Christmas with us, but Sully’s first.

We raced up I-95 in my sister’s car to Mayfair. My parents and younger brother, Grant, live in the same Northeast Philly rowhome that we all grew up in. They’ve been there since I was born and that’s where we go every Christmas Day.

By the time we got there I was starving because our tradition is to have a big breakfast, we all make together. We do the works: pork roll, scrambled eggs, bacon, bagels, scrapple, potatoes and onions, French toast. Whatever you want for breakfast we’ll have on Christmas morning, and we stuff ourselves silly with it and then open our presents. 

I hadn’t eaten or had my coffee yet because I had expected to be there earlier. Don’t get me wrong. I knew we’d be late. I just hadn’t expected to be quite this late. Thankfully, my mom is a saint who always has a pot of coffee going and she shared a piece of crumb cake Grant had gotten for her. This staved off the worst of my hunger and prevented a caffeine headache. 

I always cook the scrapple because I make it the best. A friend of mine taught me the trick is to not cut it too thin and coat it in flour and cook it in a pan with plenty of oil. Make sure you flip it halfway through as well! This way you end up with a nice fried crust and that soft creamy center that diners in the tri state area always seem to get right but is hard to replicate at home.

I was also in charge of French toast, which was a special request from Di, and I wanted to do it justice, so I made the custard coating with cream, egg yolks (DON’T USE WHITES), and plenty of seasonings. I used cloves, cardamom, cinnamon, and nutmeg. My brother, Grant, separated the eggs for me and made sure we got Texas toast (Texas toast and challah are the best choices for French toast btw). I didn’t have time to dry out the bread in the oven (don’t make the bread stale, just toast it a little. It’s more effective) so I just hoped for the best.

(Me in front of the tree with a Christmas sweater my sister got me last year for Christmas. It has a possum with a red nose on it)

Afternoon

Once I had finished my part of the cooking and was able to sit down and eat properly, it was well past breakfast and well into brunch. I piled all my favorite breakfast meats and eggs into a hoagie roll and gorged myself. I also put some of Jesse’s eggnog into a second cup of coffee. I’m sober and lactose intolerant and Jesse was kind enough to make a dairy free version with a minimum amount of alcohol added just for the flavor. It was good! 

After we had all eaten, we decided to open our presents before my mom had to leave for work. She had a short afternoon shift. Austin decided to go up to my mom-mom’s since he hadn’t the night before so he missed the present time and would open his when he got back. 

Christmas really is about more than gifts. For me it really is about the family gathering during the darkest days of the year and the rituals and traditions that come with it. That being said…there were presents. We all got lots of cool stuff and I won’t go into too much detail here, but I did get a new pair of Docs, a t-shirt with a raccoon on it, a bunch of socks, a magic eight ball, and art. 

My favorite was all the gifts my mom got from my sister. Di bought her a bunch of Barbie dolls that my mom had as collectibles that Di had opened when she was a kid along with some others. It was nice to see my mom get so excited about toys. It was almost like a reversal of the parent-kid dynamic on Christmas. I love my mom dearly and I’m always happy to see her have some joy.

After my mom left for work, we started watching “How the Grinch Stole Christmas” (that’s the one with Jim Carrey). It was fun and silly, and I forgot how good a movie it was. I love how thirsty Martha May is for the Grinch and that the Grinch is raised by two old lesbian coded Whos. Near the end of the movie, I took a break to call my girlfriend and wish her a Merry Christmas and Happy Chanukah. We talked a bit since they were stuck at home sick, but we didn’t talk too long since they were exhausted and needed to rest.

After the Grinch was over, I was feeling really exhausted from the whole morning and from dealing with my dad. I don’t want to get into my relationship with my father, but I will say that I’m not the only person in my family that should be sober, and I find him a pain in the ass most of the time. 

Jesse suggested we go for a walk to get out of the house and help digest. We rounded up all the siblings that were still home and took our Cecil for a walk down Rowland Ave. It was nice to walk along the street and see how some things had changed in my childhood neighborhood. Lincoln High School has been completely redone for years so that wasn’t new, but they had also redone the playground nearby too. 

(My mommy, Diane, and Cecil the family dog)

(New boot goofin’)

(Grant on the left and Di on the right)

(Jesse in Christmas contemplation)

(The original artwork Jesse made for the cover of my poetry book 31 Days With Venus Aphrodite)

(The crew on Cecil’s walk. Sully is the front left. Di is front right. Jesse is back left. Grant is back right.)

(The squad by Pennypack Park and a field I used to play soccer on as a kid. 

In the front from left to right: Cecil, Di, me. In the back: Grant, Sully, Jesse)

Evening

When we got back from our walk, we watched Austin open his presents since he hadn’t while he was visiting our grandparents. We also opened the cards they had sent back with him.

I might be getting my timeline wrong with this but at some point, we all played Scattergories. I think it happened after Austin got back but it might’ve happened before he left. It also might’ve happened a little bit later in the day after dinner. I’m not sure. Either way we played it, and I got trounced even though it’s one of my favorite board games. 

Grant and Di decided to visit my mom-mom and pop-pop too. They hadn’t gone the night before either and wanted to go and pick up Chinese food for dinner anyway. 

We put on “It’s A Wonderful Life” at Sully’s suggestion while we waited for them to get back. Austin hadn’t seen it before, so it was fun to watch it with him. I hadn’t seen it in a long time, and it really hit home. I teared up several times especially since this was my first time watching it since my suicide attempt. It's a classic for a reason even if the edits are weird sometimes.

The movie got interrupted by my siblings’ return with the Chinese food, along with my mom. We ate and finished the movie. I was feeling tired and sick of my dad for the second time of the day, so I went into my mom’s room and took a moment of solace. When I came down with my siblings, we’re watching some terrible weird campy horror movie called “Jack Frost” and it was getting close to midnight, and I had work in the morning so I asked if we could all go home. 

We squeezed back into Di’s car, and she drove us all home and I went to bed exhausted but full of holiday cheer.

(Sully on their phone. Austin opening presents. My forearm. I love candid photos)