She knelt on the carpet in her new living-room, a big cardboard box in front of her, unwrapping ornaments

Set the timer to 10 minutes for this one

She knelt on the carpet in her new living-room, a big cardboard box in front of her, unwrapping ornaments and couldn't help but think of all her past Christmases.

She thought back to the first one she could remember: 4 years old, living in the suburbs of Chicago. She remembered the design on the living room carpet then (and noticed some similarities to the one she had now.) She remembered the smell of egg nog and the all too loud voice of her Aunt Isabel. She remembered her father's hairy forearms as he picked her up, with the star in hand, to place the final decoration on the Christmas tree. She remembered feeling safe and happy and warm.

Her memory flickered and she thought to the Christmas at 10 years old - perhaps the last Christmas she was happy. She remembered opening up presents in front of her family. A journal for a present; she still wrote little anecdotes and quotes in that journal to this day. She remembered posing on the couch with her brother and parents, the camera on the tripod like a sentry guard, trying, and failing to guard over the last semblance of happy, familial serenity she'd have.

She remembered the next Christmas after that, the first one after the divorce. She tried not to, but couldn't help thinking about the downwards spiral of her parents relationship through that year. How had it taken only a year for those two giants in her eyes to fail so miserably at the most important challenge of all? How had they succumbed to their quarrels and disagreements?

She remembered being at her Mothers house for Christmas that year. She remembers seeing a tear streaming down her mothers face. Remembers watching the sunlight hit it. She looked calm and beautiful then in a somber sort of way.

She remembered Christmas the year after that, this time by her Father. She remembered his new girlfriend Nicole and how she had felt so uncomfortable with her joining in on the pictures, sitting in the same position as her Mother once had. Tucked under her Fathers forearms. Those hairy, hairy forearms.

She remembered her first Christmas out of the house, celebrating with her college roomates. The feeling of weird comfort and confusion in being an adult. She remembered the gifts her friends had gotten her, the drinks they had shared, the parties they had gone to. A smile spread across her face as she remembered that.

She snapped out of her recollection and looked back at the box in front of her. College had been ten years ago, she realized. She looked at the box in her hands and a tear began to stream down her face, catching the light of the living room. She looked at her fireplace and on the pictures above. She looked at her two children and her husband beside her and couldn't help but smile. Christmas was about family and, through all those Christmases, she wouldn't have had it any other way.