Christmas is a time of year when family togetherness is important. grandmas and grandpas travel to visit their children and grandchildren. Aunts, uncles and cousins zip their suitcases and board their flights or start the road trip toward their sibling's houses. All families whether immediate or extended have Christmas traditions. My favorite tradition is going to see Christmas lights. Every Christmas Eve, my parents, sister and I drive around our town and look at Christmas lights. We have a list of neighborhoods with extravagant lighting and decorations we visit each year. My dad brings hot chocolate with marshmallows and we listen to Christmas songs on the radio. This year, I'd like to revisit a specific Christmas lights memory.
When I was in seventh grade, my family flew to Pittsburgh to spend the holidays with my dad's side of the family. I was hoping we'd be able to do a Holiday light activity even though we were out of town. My uncle suggested a drive through Christmas lights show. My family piled into five separate cars and drove the thirty minutes to the lights. Everyone else must've had the same idea because when we got there the line was at least a forty five minute wait. I was in a car with my sister, cousin, Grandma and dad. We had the Christmas music on, the heat cranked and were catching up and joking around with each other.
After we'd been in line for fifteen minutes, my aunt called from another car and told us her two kids had to go pee. There were no bathrooms anywhere because the idea was to stay in your car the entire time. Around five minutes after the call from my aunt, we got a call from my Uncle's car. My cousins John and Noah had to go pee as well. A half hour or so went by and then it was our turn to call the other cars. My sister, cousin and I all had to go pee now, bringing the total from three up to seven. My grandma, seeing the humor in this situation started laughing pretty hard. My cousin Jenna thought my grandma was laughing at her and started crying. My sister and I had to pee so bad we started crying too. My boy cousins had it easy, they just got out of the car, went behind some trees and came right back. The fact that they had it so easy that they could pee wherever they wanted only made the three of us cry harder. The front seat of our car was in utter hysterics and the backseat was a preteen hormonal nightmare.
At this point we were so close to the front of the line, but nobody could take it anymore. Four of the five cars turned around and drove the thirty minutes back to my Aunt's house. It was a track marathon when we got back to her house, she only has three bathrooms. There were people calling dibs on a certain bathroom and others just ran at a sprint into the house to get there first. It wouldn't be my family if it wasn't complete chaos, I can't wait to do it again sometime. Merry Christmas everybody and pees on Earth.
