Ed note: This column is written as a letter from Ryn to her mother.

Dear Mom,
Sorry I cannot make it home for the holidays this year but when I hear the Christmas carols piping at top volume down Sheepshead Bay Road I feel as "at home" as I can get. Doesn't matter if you're in Brooklyn or Michigan: loud, annoying noises and the holiday season go together like eggnog and rum. Don't think I'll be drinking any eggnog myself this year, I just read something about milk cultures and diarrhea so I'll probably stick to my herbal tea. I can sip it at night in front of the fireplace -- we use Mitch's ashtray when it smolders from an improperly extinguished cigarette. We even got a tree this year. It goes nicely with the Menorah in the window. Not a real tree, of course (well, I mean live -- even the artificial trees are real in the sense that they are not surreal -- but the live ones are no longer alive -- it makes no sense, this terminology, anyway...). Even though you may have heard that a tree grows in Brooklyn, the only real tree in the tri-state area is imported from some remote farm in the boondocks and stuck in Rockefeller Center where they ice skate around at dizzying speeds in their underwear.

Yes, I have been dressing warmly for this winter season. I am even on my third pair of gloves! (The other two pairs were a bust: I lost one and then bought a green pair that matches absolutely nothing.) And I have been making use of the sweaters you sent. The $600 purple cashmere is now emblazoned with a Yankees logo so I look more native New York. And those handmade booties from grandma really do the trick for cold winter feet. Too bad Mitch won't let me wear them to the store. They would get wet, anyway.

Not that it snows much here. The only snow we get is usually mixed with rain and turns to yellow mush instantly. I probably won't be engaging in any outdoor winter sports this year. The only time I tried to build a snowman someone knocked his head off the next day and I think a homeless man ate the carrot. And I don't think sledding butt-first down the icy steps at the Stillwell Avenue subway station without a sled counts for winter fun. Oh, I never told you that? Don't worry. I am being careful.

And I promise not to do what I did in 1995 -- call tearfully on the day before Christmas Eve when airfares are at an all-time high, begging to jump on the next plane to Detroit. I'll wait until New Year's Eve for that one.

Happy Holidays. I love and miss you and Dad. I also miss his all-out decorations of the house. Did he put up the lights yet? Every time I see Lampoon's Christmas I get a warm, fuzzy place in my heart for him. And I surely miss your special Christmas breakfast casserole, but last time we tried it we had to get a new oven.

Your Loving Daughter,
Ryn

P.S. Did your cats get used to the antlers yet?