Rules of Engagement

Well, Cadre, good morning and welcome from sunny Bucieres, Mexico, where my husband has been at a house for the last few weeks and we are now at the same house for the next few days. And it's pretty nice, I gotta say. This is like the back yard. It's part of this compound that some folks we know. Hey, buddy. Hey, Jules. Hello, everybody. Oh, Buddy the elf. Good morning. Good morning, Luke. Good morning, everybody. If you are someone who celebrates Christmas, today is Christmas Eve. And if you're somebody who does not celebrate Christmas, if you're in America, it is hard to avoid that today is Christmas Eve.

So if you celebrate Merry Christmas, and if you don't, I hope these days go quickly for you and we can all get back to celebrating New Year's. So good morning, Jules. And I've been thinking about so many things in preparation for this, but one of them is traditional, because this is a time of year that lots of people who celebrate Christmas and, you know, maybe other holidays think about tradition. Thank you, Luke. I also think you are the best and I hope that you are doing well. You might be somewhere colder than where I am right now.

So for everybody in a colder place, I hope it's warm inside your hearts and inside your homes. My mother passed away in September of 2020, and I had the good fortune of having had a really great mom and under difficult circumstances, but she was a really great mom and she was keeper of the traditions in our family. And my brother and his wife in Minnesota have very much taken over the role of traditions keep. But I don't live in Minnesota and I'm certainly not in Minnesota right now. And so I have some traditions that I've upheld over the years around this holiday.

I watch Die Hard every year and have done for maybe 25 years before there was even a debate about whether or not Die Hard was a Christmas movie. I watched Die Hard every Christmas, usually by myself as I wrapped gifts. That's how it started. And then often my husband and I travel around now. So this is kind of our tradition. And this year we're actually going to be with my step kids and their partners. So there's a little bit of a tradition there. So one thing I'm wondering is, do I want more tradition than I have?

Because that's not a lot, right? Some people have traditions that start months ago and go into today, and I really, really don't. So if anybody has thoughts about the traditions in their lives and whether or not they add value and what they think about them, let me know. Let me know if you have traditions that you value, not just around Christmas, because not everybody celebrates Christmas, but around anything, because it turns out I do have lots of traditions in my life and some of them I call habits, right?

So I have a lot of habits, as it turns out, that I've cultivated over the years. I write every night before I go to bed and I read something every night before I go to bed. I have a five year line, a day journal that is going to come to a close at the end of this year. Technically, I started it in March five years ago, but I think I'm gonna start my new one on January 1st, because you can start one anytime and honestly, I recommend that you do. But lots of mine all start at different times. And so I would love one that starts on January 1st or another one.

But, you know, and a friend of mine are starting traditions around. Well, a couple friends, one friend and I both love the music of Bruce Springsteen. And so we send each other messages just on big days, like, hey, happy anniversary of the release of Born to Run, my favorite album of all time. But also I saw Springsteen on Broadway on April 7, 2018 during the first run. And it is one of the most magical, important experiences of my adult life for a host of reasons, including how I got the ticket shout out to Wayne and Christopher.

Every year on April 7, I do something to celebrate or acknowledge that day. Then another friend of mine and I, he and I had been friends for 10 years when we both realized that we each had a niche president of the United States that we were interested in that isn't a big name president. Not like Truman or Lincoln or FDR or Kennedy or something. Nope, we both had a weird interest in President Chester A. Arthur. Don't get me started. I can give you all sorts of trivia. Mine started when I saw the movie Die Hard with a Vengeance.

Again with a Die Hard. It is my favorite movie of all time. And in that there's a pivotal scene that takes place at Chester A. Arthur Middle School. And I remember being like, is there actually a Chester A. Arthur Middle School? And when that movie came out, of course there was no way to find out. So I did all the research I could about Chester A. Arthur. Of course, when the Internet came out, I found out that no, of course there is not a Chester A. Arthur Middle School like anywhere. Even though he did one of the biggest positive turnarounds of any president in history.

He became president when Garfield was murdered. And up until then, the role of vice president had just been a way of getting votes. And no one expected him very much of him, but he actually did a few really great things, one of which is he vetoed the first iteration of the Chinese Exclusion Act. And the second is he actually did a lot to reform civil service. And since he had been a big machine kind of guy up until then, it was a big deal that he actually supported civil service reform. I told you, don't get me started.

So Chester Arthur, I have this friend. He and I both love Chester Arthur. And one notable fact about Chester Aurora that people noted at the time was that he owned 80 pairs of pants. 80 pairs of pants. So every year on his inauguration day, my friend and I buy a pair of pants or wear a pair of pants that we have bought in honor of Chester. So traditions, right? So, Jules, making my grandmother's homemade caramel rolls for breakfast is your favorite family tradition. That's amazing. I love that for you.

And I imagine you do that either on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day, perhaps not just on any day during the year. Or maybe there is some other day during the year when you do it. Okay, well, if you can hear somebody sweeping behind me, I apologize. But this is a loud place. There are. You can hear doves cooing. There were roosters crowing earlier. All sorts of stuff are happening here. So those are traditions that I've started for myself. Oh, and every year on my birthday, only because I want to, I listen to the entire album.

Born to run from start to finish without stopping. So traditions are things that we can start, even though a new tradition is an oxymoron. But a tradition is something we can think about, we can start and do on our own for all kinds of things. I just told you about a couple of made up holidays in my life that I celebrate regardless with my own traditions instead of all of them having to be around Thanksgiving or Christmas or what have you. Oh, whenever your family gathers together all year round.

See, I love that as a tradition. Whenever we get together, we have rolls. So then someday, if you're having a bad day, maybe you can make them. And then you will think of all the good times you've had with your family, which is fantastic. Now I still have the stocking that I had when I was a kid. My mother was a knitter, so she knit all of our stockings. She also, early in my recovery, when I explained to her some of the stuff that had happened that she hadn't known about. When I was a kid, my mother knit.

She also, she knit everybody in the family, an Irish fisherman sweater for years, like spouses, etc, all got their own Irish Fisherman sweaters as well as I have mine. But she knit me a blanket that was basically an Irish fisherman sweater. Yarn and knit, but it's a blanket like a throw. And she said that it was so I could have a hug from her anytime I needed it if she wasn't there. And I tell you, it's come in handy over the years when I lived far away from her and she was still alive. But now that she is dead, it's like extra nice tradition to have that in the moments when I need it most.

So I. So I'm thinking about tradition today. And I'm thinking about it especially in terms of a lot of the family traditions we had, I no longer have in my life. And I feel sad about that, I'm not gonna lie. But it also made me think about the newer traditions I have in my life. The things that I do count on to happen on a regular basis with and around people I love. And there's a lot of them. There's a lot of them. So for people for whom if you don't celebrate Christmas or other big holidays that are part of your religious tradition, that have a lot of traditions around them and you don't celebrate them for whatever reason, either because it's not your religion or because things are fraught in your family and it makes more sense to not be with them than it does to be with them, it doesn't mean the end of tradition.

It doesn't mean the end of good things in your life. It doesn't mean you can't have important things with other family members, other people that you love. Doesn't mean you can't start something just with yourself. No one listens to Born to Run With Me from start to finish on my birthday. But it's great. That is probably one of the longest enduring traditions in my life right now, as a matter of fact. So if you are someone for whom the holidays are hard, I suggest fun. I suggest doing something that you find fun.

And any holiday, if you're not somebody who celebrates Christmas, then by all means Chinese food and going to the movies it is. But my family's tradition was always on Christmas Eve. It's over many, many, many years. Once my brothers had their own kids and Christmas Day was about them and their families. My husband and I would go see movies on Christmas Day. That was for many years. That endured a couple, you know, that endured a few relationships, as a matter of fact. And I'm not going to do that here.

We're going to do some other things. There's a tradition here because my stepson and his wife spend the holiday here often. They. Everybody who's here, this is a whole compound, a bunch of houses and a bunch of people. Everybody who's here does Secret Santa. So put your name in a hat, pull out a name, and then everybody has 300 pesos, which is about $15, and we go to the market. This is on today, Christmas Eve day. Go to Central Market. You have precisely one hour to spend 300 pesos. No more. No more than an hour, no more than 300 pesos on your secret sand.

I think that's gonna be fun. I'm looking forward to that. So. All right. I hear a mower starting behind me. It's probably gonna get louder. I think I'm gonna sign off a little early today. If you do celebrate Christmas, I hope you have a great one. And if you don't, I hope you have a great end of year, however that plays out for you, and just. I'll see you all on the last day of the year, I guess. Have a good one.