Christmas with Frank (Dec. 23, 1981)

December 23, 1981

Jimmy has decided to stay home this Christmas eve. He says it’s too much, too many year of the same shit over and over.

I guess I understand. But Frank won’t.

Frank is a romantic and of us in terms of fifteen years ago.

Jimmy says he just wants some quiet time alone with Ginger.

“Last year we ran around from this place to that place and it drove her nuts,” Jimmy said. “This year Ginger has only one day in the north before she has to return to Philly and I don’t see enough of her as it is.”

I told him I understood; secretly envying the exotic life he lived in this old house up on the top of this mountain. I also wished I had someone like Ginger to share this Christmas Eve with.

My on-and-off girlfriend said she’s sick so I’m on my own – and I feel lonelier than ever on account of it.

Frank called last night to tell me of his plans, and if I had someone like Ginger I could beg off the way Jimmy is, but I don’t, and I’m condemned to spend the night wandering around with the boys just as I have every other Christmas eve for the last decade..

Garrick will be with us this year, too. He’s had other options on other years, but never got over the love of his life he had a decade ago.

I keep hoping for a last minute reprieve, a call from my ex-wife out west, who I would like to see, but know that it won’t be possible – not yet.

Garrick said he would like to do something different this year.

“How much can it hurt us going to some dark little bar, where we can pick up some girls?” he asked.

Frank doesn’t like the idea. He said we can pick up girls any other day of the year. This is our night. Besides, the only people we’re going to find in a bar on Christmas Eve are people as lonely as we are.

“You don’t want to hang around with depressing people like that, do you?” Frank asked.

I bite my tongue to keep from saying that’s exactly what we plan to do, we three lonely kings looking for Christmas, while thinking of the women we’d really liked to be with.

I know Garrick still thinks about his ex. But I don’t know whether Frank still pines over Peggy and her kid the way he once did. If he does, he puts on a good front and it hasn’t stopped him from seeking out every other woman he could possibly make love to.

“Fuck him,” Frank grumbled in reference to Jimmy. “If he wants to spend time with Ginger instead of us, that’s his misfortune.”

Garrick and I exchanged looks, both of us knowing that we’d trade places with Jimmy in a heartbeat, and so would Frank.

But alas, the plans are set; we’re going to be spending another Christmas with Frank.