WINTER

Every year for most of my adult life, my mom gets the whole family together every Christmas, and we drive 20 minutes down Katella Blvd. to the "happiest place on earth".  My siblings and I are far too old to be anything but generally amused and lightly annoyed by the park, but it is nice to get together with the family.  In a way it is kind of nostalgic, after all, we are Americans, we live in lala land.  I tend to end up over thinking it all, I don't know what the tree means, why we put lights on it, why the government makes firemen take down their snowmen, how a societal convention around a random winter day can suddenly make Walmart attractive, and further more, cause 5am stampedes to buy mass produced, cheap ass, made in China crap.  People get trampled every year, people get offended every year, and I keep silently making photographs, that without trying to, somehow paint a picture of my feelings on the whole thing.  The innocence of an exited dog, the exhausted santa.  I don't know what it all means, but I've decided to lighten up and get a tree this year.  It's a live spruce in dirt with some little colored lights on it and it sits 2 feet tall.  I want to be more like the exited dog.  Here are some images taken this year and last.  Merry Christmas and/or other holiday that does or does not offend you.