Christmas, the commercials tell us, is a children's holiday. So how do teenagers remember their childhood Christmases? For all the emphasis placed on gifts, what mattered most, according to these YO! writers, is what parents did -- or didn't do -- at Christmas time. YO! (Youth Outlook) is a publication by and about Bay Area youth produced by Pacific News Service.

The faces and settings changed over the years, but the words remained the same. I'd be decorating the tree, or making fudge with my grandmother, or cleaning up wrapping paper from the floor, when some relative would wander by and say:

"Honey, don't you think it's about time you went on a diet?"

Or: "We wanted to get you that sweater you liked, but they didn't have it in your size."

Or: "Careful on that ladder. I don't think it's meant to hold someone as big as you. Maybe your sister should put up the lights."

The closer it got to Christmas, the more I wanted to die so I wouldn't have to run the gauntlet of my family's negative attitudes about my "weight problem." It's not like they forgot I was fat during the rest of the year. But the holidays seemed to give them a special desire to have me look like an "ideal" girl and an array of opportunities to express their dissatisfaction with how I'd turned out.

Christmas morning I'd put on my baggiest pants and a big T-shirt, and fill a backpack with sketch books and colored pencils. When we got to my grandparents' house I'd curl up in some corner and try to look small. It never worked.

By the end of the day I'd heard dozens of comments, from "Don't take any more potatoes, dear -- they're fattening," to "I got your gift a size smaller for motivation." Each comment lodged itself indelibly in my mind, only to be recalled, years later, during some period of depression.

It wasn't until junior high, when I spent Christmas at a friend's house, that I stopped feeling suicidal over Christmas. Christmas Eve we stayed up late making cookies, and wrapping little gifts like socks and markers and scented bath balls. Christmas Day we spent the whole day playing bridge and dirty word scrabble, going on long walks with the dog, making gingerbread houses.

It was the first Christmas I spent away from my family and the first Christmas I forgot I was fat.

My most memorable Christmas began the day we bought a beautiful green Christmas tree, a tree so lovely it made me sad it had to be cut off from nature just so we could display it. That same day we bought so many decorations they filled our hands. All I wanted to do was get home and fill the tree with them -- beautiful lights that would sparkle for the whole of December. I hoped they would catch my dad's eye when he passed by our window.

My mom and dad had been fighting for months, eventually causing him to leave home. This made me really sad. Whenever I asked Mom why they were fighting she'd change the subject or not answer. I did my best to get into the Christmas spirit, but as long as my dad was gone, Christmas didn't feel the same.

As the big day approached my mom invited the whole family to come to our home. I couldn't wait to see my cousins. But I kept wondering where my dad was.

Then Christmas Eve came. Everything looked and smelled great. The table was filled with all kinds of foods and treats, the tree was lit up like a skyscraper. All that was left were the guests. "Ding Dong." Whoops, they're here! Hellos rang out as each family member entered my home. But the most important person was missing.

By quarter to twelve, my Dad still hadn't come. I was so sad nothing could cheer me up, not even the sight of the beautiful tree with all the gifts around it. At midnight my mom called everyone to gather around the tree. I stood silently in a corner.

Just then there was a loud screech outside. "Did you hear that?" I shouted. We ran to the door and opened it, only to find a tall fat man outside dressed up like Santa Claus. "Merry Christmas!" he yelled and walked in with a big bag full of presents. I barely noticed them. All that mattered was that my family was together again.

The funny thing about Christmas is that I never believed in Santa Claus. I always knew the stuff I got was bought by someone. And although I was one of only two or four kids in the entire neighborhood who lived with both my biological parents, that someone was never my father. It was my big brother.

He was a dope dealer -- or I should say THE dope dealer. He liked lavish living and he was the prototype for anyone who didn't want to wait for their riches. My Dad was just the opposite. He's a church-going fella who believes that whatever you have to take shortcuts to get -- especially illegal ones -- is bad. Hard, honest work is his motto.

One Christmas Eve I remember the entire floor around the Christmas tree was bare. My little brother and I went to bed depressed and stayed in bed the next morning. We knew there'd be no presents to open. Then Moms called us downstairs and we both walked into a sea of presents -- my first 10-speed bike, hundreds of action figures, a robot, etc., etc--all from my big brother.

I don't want to imply that my father didn't do anything for us. But being hard working meant most of the time he wasn't able to give us what we wanted. (The worst Christmas I remember was when he took my brother and me to the mall and gave us each $100. By then we were so used to getting it all we felt disappointed.)

My brother took the illegal route and made himself rich while Pops took the legal route and stayed broke.

You figure out who made Christmas in our family.

I woke to the clatter of pots and pans, the noisy murmur of my relatives gossiping, and the sweet aroma of my mother's cooking. I scrambled down the stairs, only to be greeted by my oldest cousin, Louis, who piggy-backed me the rest of the way to the dining room.

The house was bursting with an overwhelming sense of warmth. All the relatives were there, the table was beautifully set, the tree was up and fully decorated, and every one of my relatives remembered to give me a present. All the relatives lined up by generation and my grandfather led us in paying respects to our ancestors--"Yi (one) kowtow, niang (two) kowtow, san (three) kowtow"--and also in saying grace.

We had hot pot: large dishes of raw food which we boiled in a huge pot of chicken soup and dipped into hot barbecue sauce and raw egg. While we ate, my grandfather told stories about when he was young, before the Communists took over China. My dad added in his stories of what he did to my uncles when they were young, like making them smell poop. And my older cousins joined in with their latest escapades with the opposite sex.

We laughed at their tales, gave them silly advice, and toasted the holiday with wine and grape juice. After dinner, my uncle gathered us into the generational rows again and we gave three kowtows to my grandparents to thank them for everything they had done for us.

Was it all a dream? A heavy cloud has settled over Christmas for my family, ever since my grandparents--the string that bound my family together--both died of cancer five and six years ago. Now my relatives don't bother with gifts for me, my parents just give me money, and the family gathering has shrunk from 25 to five.

As I approach the last Christmas before I go away to college and start life on my own, I can't help but feel a little loneliness, a yearning for the warmth of Christmas past.

Most of the people I grew up with rarely got what they wanted for Christmas. I didn't. Once in a blue moon, I'd get money as a present. But that only made it harder because everything I wanted was too expensive.

One Christmas I managed to get a massive number of G.I. Joe action figures. The reason was that I'd received an outstanding score on my math quiz. If I hadn't done something to earn the G.I. Joes, I probably wouldn't have gotten them. The lesson I discovered that Christmas was that you only get what you pay for.

Christmas, 1993, had all the makings of a disaster -- a 2500 mile road trip down South with four people crammed into a two passenger rental car. It turned into the best Christmas my family ever spent together.

The first four days were the hardest. My brother and I complained, bickered and generally made life unpleasant for my parents. Then came our first stop -- Albuquerque -- and a truce, thanks to quesadillas and Native American blankets which pacified us. Occasional arguments erupted as the little Honda rental puttered down the highway, but my parents stopped them by stuffing sopapillas down our throats. Food became the real bonding tool for my family.

At least we arrived at our destination, Louisiana: The Riverwalk, the French Quarter, Bourbon Street, the Bayou. We spent time in Shreveport and Lafayette, visiting family and getting into the whole Creole jazz scene. Then New Orleans where the fried alligator and chocolate suicide cake, the open air markets and jazz made up for the ridiculous prices and scam artists.

I'd been dreading Christmas Day -- waking up in a Motel 6 without a tree or presents wouldn't be exactly festive. But it didn't matter. We spent the day at my cousin's house, learning to dance zydeco. Eventually the whole neighborhood joined us, partying like it was 1999.

We drove home happy and sated, with no arguments -- the first time I found myself wishing our whole family spent more time together.

What I remember best about Christmas in my early childhood was how my mother would always come to my great grandmother's house with two big garbage bags of things for me -- one full of clothes and the other full of toys.

I lived with my great grandmother back then. My mother wasn't around very much and there was a lot of hate and anger between them.

When my mother would come with the two bags and ring the door bell, I'd hear her beg my great grandmother to let me see her. I'd run to the front window only to see her walking away from the house, in tears. I'd wave to her and try to open the front door but I couldn't reach the door knob.

I can seriously say that no matter what, I always enjoyed Christmas Day, especially opening all those gifts from my mother.

Why do juvenile halls and jails fill up on the holidays? As someone who spent one New Year's Eve (which was also my eighteenth birthday) locked up for stealing a car, I think I have an answer.

I was on Christmas vacation from my first year in college with nowhere to go. My dad and I weren't getting along because I wouldn't listen to him. My mom wouldn't let me stay with her because of things I'd done in the past. So I had spent Christmas couch-surfing with friends and feeling sorry for myself.

On New Year's Day I borrowed a friend's skateboard -- a Christmas gift from his mom -- promising to take good care of it. Instead, I decided to steal a car and go on a solo joy ride. It was dawn when a cop car drove up behind me and yelled through the loud speaker, "Pull over now!" I spent a week at city jail, waiting for my court date, in an over-crowded cell where newcomers had to fight for space to sleep on the floor. The food was meager and lousy, and everyone could see you when you went to the bathroom.

I read a few books -- Siddhartha, Drew Barrymore's autobiography, one about a couple of poor young girls in Dublin, another about three Hollywood actresses. I wound out with a light sentence -- hella hours of community service as a phone-banker -- but with a strike against me. I was also never able to get my friend's skateboard back which put a big dent in our relationship.

If there's a lesson here it's this: Life for children from broken families can be a living hell during the holidays. This Christmas, reach out to the kid with nowhere to stay, who may not feel loved otherwise.

I could care less about Christmas. It has never been the happy, joyful family holiday it's commercialized to be. There always seems to be some type of family tragedy around my house. This year my mother passed away so I think I'm spending Christmas 95 alone. I would rather be at home alone than with everyone else, pretending to have the holiday spirit.

There never were too many presents under the tree and our tree was never as pretty as everyone else's. I can remember my brother's stocking being filled with cans of beer and packs of cigarettes. One year, he even had a black eye on Christmas morning.

One holiday when I was about eight my brother and father were both in jail and both of my grandparents had recently passed away. Our entire family was falling apart. Still, I remember how my mom struggled to make it good for me. We ate in the front room -- just me, my mom, my dog and my cat. My mom even made them plates of food just because she knew I would enjoy it.

Now I know when I decide to have a family I'll have to bury all my bad feelings so that my children can have the type of family holiday I always wished for.