Brandi Adam, 33, woke up the day after Christmas, her head buzzing with holiday happiness.
Almost immediately, though, dread began to seep into her memory. She remembered it was Dec. 26, not the 25th, and that her Christmas Day had gone badly.
Ms. Adam, a second-grade teacher at McConnell Elementary School, explains that she had a disappointing Christmas on several counts.
“It’s really all about family,” she said in an interview early last week.
A Hurricane Katrina refugee, Ms. Adam had a flood of troubles Christmas Day. She missed her family (her mother died recently), her younger sister was far away in Connecticut (they had never been apart at Christmas before), and others in her life didn’t share her Christmas spirit.