Since I did not post what I intended around the holidays, I thought I would play catch-up now. Note that this is the only area of my life in which I happen to be in the vicinity of punctuality. I still have not yet mailed any Christmas cards and am seriously considering penciling in “Happy Martin Luther King, Junior’s Birthday!” should I eventually get them out the door.

But according to my boyfriend and my psychiatrist, I should keep a New Year’s resolution not to beat myself up over my current shortcomings.

What does that leave, except my past shortcomings?

Picture it: the holiday season, 1980. (And let’s ignore for a moment that my official year of birth is 1983. This is clearly a caper that unfolds over four dimensions.) My burgeoning dorkiness and artistic vision having come to the fore, I decided to produce a spectacular Christmas Slide Show starring my Star Wars action figures and a papier-mâché Santa and Mrs. Claus set my mother displayed on the dining room table. This required unprecedented photographic innovation, as both Santa and his wife were dozens of times larger than Luke Skywalker and the gang. I made use of my father’s camera and spent diligent hours recording dialogue from a talking computer he brought home from work. This multimedia extravaganza was to debut on Christmas Day and feature the tale of How the Rebellion Saved Christmas from Darth Vader by Flying Around in a Sleigh Made from a Matchbox Car Case.

Not one of the slides developed properly, a miracle for which I thank the Universe each and every day of my adult life.