A Bay Area Christmas

December 25, 2018

I was born in Oakland. My family has been in the Bay Area for about a century, first in the farmlands of San Jose and Hayward and later in the hills of Berkeley, Walnut Creek, and Lafayette. For the last 35 years I’ve lived in the North Bay, first in Marin and now in Sonoma County. The Bay Area has been home to generations of my family, and I’ve known all of them, including the first to arrive here around 1920: my great grandparents. So spending Christmas with my family is a big deal.

And it was probably more than a century ago when my mother’s mother first learned the words to a strange campfire song that has become part of our family Christmas tradition. Mr Donnerybeck is a song that has nothing to do with Christmas, but we’ve been singing it on Christmas Eve all of my life and probably well before my time. It’s a song about a man who has a sausage machine that grinds up rats, cats, and eventually himself.

Yeah, I know – merry Christmas. How it ended up being sung along with Jingle Bells and Silent Night is a bit of a mystery, but now its quirkiness is a source of perverse pride in our extended Irish clan. It makes us different, unique, and silly. It allows us to laugh at ourselves while carrying on the customs of the Kenneys. In a world of constant change, we always have Mr Donnerybeck on Christmas Eve. And we always have each other.

My family has so much to be grateful for. We live in the beautiful Bay Area, we’re all enjoying our very different lives, and we’re all blessed with excellent health. Well, almost all of us.

Today was a gorgeous day around the Bay, and this morning some of us walked around the lovely Lafayette Reservoir as part of another family Christmas tradition. But not my mom.

After our walk we gathered around her bedside to wish her well and spend the holiday with her. She has no specific illness, but at 87 she has seen better days. She put up a cheerful front, laughing and exchanging stories and gifts and being amused by the birds and squirrels outside her window. She’s a trooper, as my stepfather says. It felt good to savor each moment with her.

I left my family home to drive to my home in Sebastopol, and along the way I was treated to the wonders of the Bay Area. Emerging from the Caldecott tunnel in the Oakland/Berkeley hills, a panorama: the silvery Bay crossed by the graceful towers and cables of the Bay Bridge; the pewter-colored erector set design of the Richmond/San Rafael Bridge; and at the edge of the horizon, the vermillion magnificence of the Bridge Over the Golden Gate. The spires of the City By The Bay gleamed white in the sunlight, and the flanks of Mt Tamalpais and the hills and islands around the Bay are turning green after the recent rains. Shangri La. My home. My family.

Merry Christmas, Mom. I love you.