The Cost of Going Home for Christmas

Photo credit: Alison and Fil, CC BY 2.0.

“I’ll be home for Christmas.” The song lyrics pinballed in my head as the car slid to a halt in the median of the interstate. The sedan driving slowly in front of me had slipped in this same spot only a few seconds before. I saw the danger but didn’t brake fast enough. Now I sat facing the opposite direction as the snow collected on the hood of the car.

The ill-fated decision to set off in the snow had been made about 8 miles ago, or 30 minutes back. Once on the main road, I had guessed that the going would get better. It didn’t. Crossing over the state line between Pennsylvania and Maryland, I noticed the change in the roads but not the weather. I had 47 miles to go.

“Please, don’t be broken,” I pleaded aloud to my aging silver Saturn. My $6.50 an hour job at a local museum was ending in a few days when my high-school boyfriend and I would be transferring together to a college a few states away. I had planned to spend the holidays with him at his parents’, but, wanting to be the daughter they could count on, I couldn’t resist making a surprise Christmas visit to mine. I also couldn’t afford a major repair now. “I don’t even have AAA,” I thought, making a mental note to ask for a membership to the car club for my birthday. Rounding the passenger side, I expected to see my wheel pointed in the wrong direction. But no! It was a Christmas miracle! I was able to turn the car around and get back on the road.

It was a minor weather event by all meteorological accounts; the snow was sticking just enough to make the trek treacherous. “I’m going to make it,” I persuaded myself as I hummed along, starting to believe it. I imagined my reception at my ultimate destination: the daughter who came home for Christmas. I reveled in the thought. And then it happened. My windshield wipers, which had been working hard to clear my view, flew to the side. The blade affixed to the driver’s half flapped and smacked the side of my car. I couldn’t pull over. I rolled down my window, desperately reaching for the wiper blade to set it right. I undid my seatbelt to improve my reach. After a few lashings, I finally grabbed it. I underestimated the force that would fling it out of my hand and rip my favorite winter glove.

I mentally calculated that I wouldn’t have to replace the glove because my boyfriend and I were going to college in a place where the daytime January temperature averaged 60 degrees. While all of this was unfolding, the car remained in motion. At this point I was weaving all over the road, and I had to get off the highway. I turned the wipers off, gripped my wheel, and stuck my head out the driver’s side window as snow continued to accumulate on the glass. I cranked the car’s climate setting up to maximum heat in a desperate attempt to keep my windscreen from filling up. It was the worst game of Tetris I’ve ever played, and I was losing badly. 

I pulled off at the nearest exit and skidded into a parking spot at a gas stop, about 12 miles from my destination. The wiper now thrashed about, attempting to go in a circle. I’d broken it. Being Christmas day, I expected that the attendant would commiserate with my predicament, let me use a phone, maybe even call a tow for me. Instead, he pointed me in the direction of the pay phone. I scavenged fifty cents from my car but didn’t see the $80 in cash that I had shoved into my right pocket fall to the ground.

Near tears, I phoned my dad, who was completely surprised! Especially now that he had to clear off his car and come get me. As I waited, the snow tapered off and the sun began to shine through the clouds. I thought this signaled a change in fortune. It was in his car on the way home that I realized the money was gone. After the incident on the interstate, a damaged wiper motor, the Grinch in a gas station uniform and now this, I cried out my Christmas spirit. $80 was two days’ take-home pay! Not knowing what else to do, he did the only thing a loving father could do for their daughter on the holiday. He took me out for Chinese food. I ordered Peking duck; he picked up the tab. I’d estimate that it exceeded $20.

Once the weather cleared and I regained composure we went back to the gas station. The bills were nowhere to be found, but I’m sure that my kicking at the slush gave the attendant some evening entertainment. The car was dropped off at our go-to garage for inspection the following day. I was too embarrassed by the whole event to save the bill, but I remember the sticker shock. Parts and labor together totaled over $300.

More devoted (or determined) daughters regularly spend as much—if not more—to go home for Christmas, but those trips are usually planned well in advance to take advantage of airline deals, credit card points, and grandma’s Florida vacation home. My impromptu holiday adventure cost me more than $400 and my 18-year old pride. Practical people that they are, my parents didn’t see the value in me risking life, limb, car, and cash to clamor home for Christmas. Even after they moved out of the snow belt, they’ve issued no expectations that anyone in our family hop a plane for the holidays. “I’ll Be Home for Christmas” cost me that Christmas—but only because I let myself take its lyrics to heart.

Thea Aronson is a creative consultant who lives with her husband in sunny New Mexico.

This piece is part of The Billfold’s Holidays and Money series.

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