This Christmas

 This Christmas, we are traveling to Austin and I cannot wait! I cannot wait to see my kids and hug them so tight no one can breathe. I can’t wait to feel some warmer weather winding its way into my chilled bones.  I cannot wait to hear some Texas twang hit my ears and some stranger smile at me and say “Hello” simply because we are in Texas.  I cannot wait for some tacos to hit my tastebuds and belly and my queso-level hit an all-time high.  It is a short trip because Phoebe isn’t going and it’s crazy expensive and my person and I also need time over break to sit in our own house and simply be: be tired, be lazy, be content.

I do find that among this not being able to wait that I am also hit with some cold-hard facts I like to ignore from time to time.  Things like my kids are not kids.  They are grown adults.  They have jobs and their own people and while I know they are happy I am coming, they are also living their own busy lives.  Will recently got a new job and can’t ask for time off and I probably won’t even see him.  Sophie doesn’t know when she has off yet and has her own set of Christmas plans.  My person has a whole family of people excited to see him and we are also traveling with his small person who always has her own set of expectations.  It will be a real adventure!

Confronted with a reality that is not at all what I pictured, I find myself wishing to be haunted by a Ghost of Christmas Past.  We recently read “A Christmas Carol” with 7th grade Language Arts classes and if Scrooge got to see some good things, why can’t I?  I’m no miser!  (the fact that I don’t have enough money to see if I would be a miser does not count).  And as long as I am dreaming up this entire thing, I get to pick out my ghost and where they take me to haunt.  No embarrassing moments or remember when you were a jerk.  Please, I have anxiety. I do that all on my own, especially at about 3am.  

I would pick either the same Ghost as the one in “A Muppet’s Christmas Carol” or Wayne Brady.  The first because he’s just a giant, good-natured guy and I like his robe.  The second because he would sing intros to every scene we visit, just like he did in “Whose Line is it Anyway?”

Rebecca, here’s your first memory

We can see you there beneath the tree.

But much catchier and more about me.  You know I pick a song intro over a good robe any day, so Wayne Brady it is.

Our first visit will be to me at age 10 at my grandparent’s house for Christmas Eve.  I am ten, just a kid, not even a whiff of puberty, and all I care about is cookies and presents and me. We have eaten dinner and we have washed so many dishes that every ounce of counter space and table top are covered with mostly-clean dishes and every single kitchen towel is used and wet and retired.  The entire family is there; we are full, we are loud, we are anxiously awaiting the signal from Grampa that we can open gifts: the scratchy sound of “Snoopy and the Red Baron” playing on the record player.  To be able to see that scene.  To be gathered in a room with people who are no longer here and hear their voice and listen to the laughter and love flowing out of that room.  Yes, please.

Next up, Christmas when my kids were small and the season was magical.  Santa is real.  Joy is real.  Wonder and merriment and have I mentioned joy? They are small, they don’t have jobs, they have me and whispered wishes to Santa.  They look at the tree and I watch the lights reflect in their eyes and once again find myself believing in all that is good in this world: hope and love and democracy and rights for women and things like that. This will be so good, I will demand Wayne Brady take me back once more.  If you are at this stage of your Christmases, SOAK IT UP!  Love those clamshell toy packages that never open and twist ties that anchor your child’s joy to the box.  It will be over so, so quickly.

Then, I want a visit with my mom.  It doesn’t even have to be Christmas.  Just a table and some coffee and my mom.  My mom before Alzheimer’s.  My mom who knew everything that was going on and happening and regaled me with which acquaintance had which new prognosis and fun facts about people I forgot about ten years ago.  My mom who talked about everything and not just the three things she feels confident talking about now.  We have a long way to go in this journey and it’s nowhere near as bad as it could get, but I still want more of my mom. 

Finally, because Wayne Brady is my Ghost and he will need a song and dance montage to feel good about my haunting, we will end with just flashes of me looking and being my very best.  Pepper in some pictures of people long past, maybe forgotten, he will end on a high note, musically,  and I will move forward in this life with the warmth of Christmases past in my heart and the knowledge of many wonderful Christmases yet to come.  Scrooge’s haunting made him change his ways; I just want a chance to appreciate the things that went by so quickly.  

Writing that makes me realize I need to appreciate this Christmas present, even if it isn’t living up to what I pictured in my head.  I will appreciate this trip with my person and his small person.  There will be joy among the madness.  I appreciate his family that is so willing to include me, and my kids, in their plans.  I will appreciate that warm, warm sun and seeing some green on trees.  I will appreciate whatever time I do get with my kids. And the next time Wayne Brady comes to show me Christmases past, I will tell him to take me to the one where queso flowed, the sun beamed brightly, and my person and I laughed and laughed about nothing and everything all at once.

The first bowl.
And if you are not reading that to the tune of "The First Noel", I am very disappointed.

Over-Done, Garish, Italianate Splendor and Joy

 A perk of this move to IL is that I can be in Lancaster, NY after just an eight hour(ish) drive.  That might seem long a long day of driving, but it used to take twenty-four hours of driving to get there from Austin, so this eight hours seems like a dream! Five states, eight hours, and approximately $500000000 in tolls.  On my list of things to do?  Get an EZ Pass.

My person and I made a late-minute decision to go to Buffalo for the holidays as our children would be celebrating with their other parents and it is just us here and that seemed sad and there were old people at home who needed to be seen.  Many reasons, all of them good, and off we went.  

Old people who needed to be seen.

My person has never been to Buffalo before so I did the very responsible thing and ordered pizza before we even exited the highway.  Everyone has their favorite local pizza and mine is Grasso's cheese and pepperoni with blue cheese to dip it into.  There is something about the crust, that thick cheese, the way the pepperoni curls up into cups and gives you a grease shooter - YUM!  You just cannot find pizza like this anywhere else.

Pizza in hand, we went to check into our hotel.  Of course family offered us a room, but it can be a lot to meet someone's family on a short trip during the holidays, and I did another responsible thing and got us a hotel.  Not any hotel, but a hotel full of Italianate splendor!  Giant chandeliers greeted us in the lobby and there was an entire hallway of fake facades made to look like a street in Italy.  I sent a video of it to my friend and she correctly remarked that it looked like the Titanic.  You could buy a single red rose for $5 and many of the rooms offered a giant tub right next to the bed.  My person and I loved how crappy and over-the-top this place was.  I would not rate it five stars because during our three nights there, housekeeping never came in.  We had no shampoo and when I asked at the desk, I was given three bottles of body wash.  This left my hair looking like a river otter who escaped an oil spill but by God, we had splendor!

my heart will go on......

We went out for a few drinks that night and my person met my sister, her husband, her sons, and two cousins in rapid succession. The next day he met my parents and an aunt and uncle and then even more people at my sister's house for Christmas Eve.  The next day he met my sister-in-law and my niece. BAM BAM BAM!  New people, my people, and he was what he always is: wonderful,  charming, engaging, and funny.  Swoon. 

This trip was fast and furious and we did the holidays and are already home and had a nap.  I am so happy that we took this trip.  That we had time to sit with my parents and talk.  That an aunt made a special trip to see me.  That my person saw where I grew up and who I grew up with and that he liked all of it.  I find that despite missing my kids this Christmas, I had joy.  What a joy to sit across the table from my nephews who have grown into men and listen to them talk about jobs and women and life in their twenties!  What a joy to spend Christmas Eve at my sister Melissa's and it be so lovely, so inclusive, so filled with people, that I felt I had stepped back in time to the Christmases of my youth! (she makes a killer sauce too. I believe my father commented it was so good it would make an old Italian woman weep.) What a joy to see the joy on my parent's face as I stepped into their house!  What a joy to still be able to step into their house.  And what a joy to do all this with my person!

I hope that you also had joy this holiday season. Joy on Christmas is not always a given, so if you didn't have joy, I hope that you find a picture you took with a stranger in the background that cracks you up and you nod and say "I love Buffalo." Or Austin. Or Raleigh. Or wherever you are currently sitting.  If you don't have a picture that makes you laugh, I hope you had some over-done, garish, Italianate splendor.  And if you didn't have over-done, garish, Italianate splendor, I know place; just bring your own shampoo.

this guy!!

The First O-E-L

 The first Christmas that I lived away from home, my mom sent me a bunch of things to help me celebrate away from them and in my new place.  There was an advent calendar full of tiny things to open each day, a VHS tape of her and my sisters baking cookies and showing me the tree, and some holiday decor of four trees that spelled out NOEL and ended in hearts.  I will admit now that I opened all of the advent calendar things the day I got it and watching them bake without me made me cry.  But, that decorative NOEL, I have put out every year at Christmastime for thirty years.  This year when I took it out, it no longer spelled NOEL.  Somewhere between this Christmas and last Christmas, between Texas and Illinois, I lost the N. I put it up anyway and my person and I laughed about celebrating our first O-E-L here in Illinois.  Then we laughed because if you say "O-E-L" fast, it sounds like "oh, well."  Forget Christmas!  We are celebrating OEL! Lost the N? Oh well.  Freezing cold but no snow?  Oh well.

The First O-E-L in Illinois

It has me thinking that this missing N is a common thing at holidays though.  Not necessarily the N but the feeling that we are missing something.  The feeling of holidays past we can't quite seem to replicate or the physical presence of someone who is no longer there to celebrate.  It can be a smell that we miss or a feeling or a place.  Sometimes, it can be missed enough that the rest of the holiday seems pale or passes by as just a day.  Sometimes, we try to plan in advance for what we will miss by doing something completely different than usual.  Sometimes, that works.

For the longest time, I missed holidays absolutely packed with people in a too warm house and not enough bathrooms.  I missed impatiently waiting with my cousins for Snoopy and the Red Baron to play and signify that we could finally open gifts. When I had my own kids, we made new holidays and I didn't miss the holidays of my childhood as much.  There is nothing, nothing, like the magic of a Christmas spent with small people who believe in Santa.  The sparkle! The joy!  The enchantment!  And yes, it's true that when my son found out there was no Santa, he smiled, patted my arm, and thanked me for "faking his childhood."  Still worth it when I remember him in footy pajamas shaking with excitement and my daughter waking us up at 3am to say "SANTA WAS HERE!"

After I got divorced, I spent quite a few holidays missing my kids because they were at their dad's or missing the way holidays used to be as a whole family unit.  It took awhile to get over the missing "N" and focus on what was left with my "OEL".  I will miss my kids this Christmas. I will miss them so much that I had Amazon deliver their presents to me so that I could wrap them and write "Love, Santa" with my left hand and mail them on.  A silly way to spend an extra $25 but oh, well.  My daughter texted and asked for the recipes for cookies and knowing she will be making them there, that she wants to carry on with the smells and tastes of her childhood memories, that really makes me happy.  

I think that with holidays and memories stored mainly in the heart and not the brain, it is so easy to get caught up on what seems to be missing.  You might be searching for a loud house, the smell of Crunchy Fudge Sandwiches, snow, kids waiting for Santa, a certain movie to watch, a person to hold.  You might want those things so very much that you can't picture this holiday with out it.  Like my NOEL, minus the N, it looks sort of the same but not as good as it once did.  I hope that even though your N is missing, that you get the chance to step back and see that the OEL is still there.  It might be way too soon for you to really appreciate your OEL with no N and that is okay too. 

I am happy that I have something from my first Christmas away that has survived at least one million moves.  It reminds me of how much I was and am loved by the family I moved away from.  Putting it up reminds me of how many Christmases it stood by as my kids were born and grew up.  Putting it up and laughing about no N with my person makes this new place feel more like home.  

I know we have more moves ahead of us and despite moving 170,000 times in the last five years, I also do not always pack the best.  So many of the ornaments that have ears lost their ears in this recent move.  There is a very good chance that more letters could fall off of the OEL.  I also know, it could lose all it's letters and be down to the string and I would still put it out.  I would just think "oh,well" as I stood in front of a beautiful tree of ear-less ornaments and smile about all the Christmases past.

So This is Christmas

As we are only four days from Christmas, I find that I will need to share some truths about Christmas.  Forgive the bulleted format, but we are only four days until Christmas and things must get done!

1.  If you don't send Christmas cards for years, you will receive fewer and fewer as the years go by.  I get it; I am not stamp-worthy and I can appreciate that.  But it is really boring to just get bills, ads, and neighborhood circulars in December.

2.  You will end up doing many things out of a sense of obligation rather than want.  It might be traveling, purchasing, baking, or wrapping.  Know this, embrace it, and don't bemoan it.  Just fall into it and do it.  Maybe you just want a Christmas at home in comfy pants and cookie plates.  That is our Christmas every year and I used to be so sad that there weren't more people to share it with.  It took me a lot of years to get past wanting a house full of people being merry and bright to see how very nice my Christmas pajama pants and a never-ending cookie plate shared with just a few can also be nice.

3.  Do the traditions you started when kids are small.  I made an advent calendar one year when I tried to be crafty.  It's a pain in the butt.  The trees are too small, it is hard to put things under them, and they fall over all the time.  I didn't do it the last few years and when the 17-year-old asked could we please, please do it this year, I hesitated.  The trees fall over, there's not enough room underneath them, and I am busy.  But, I did it.  And every day, they take turns seeing who gets what under the tree while the other watches and then laughs when that person gets a holiday Chapstick.  Let it be known that I put a holiday Chapstick in my major award box at school and that thing was a huge hit!

4.  You will be disappointed.  There is a lot of hype for Christmas starting when we are young and innocent and believe that a magic man and his reindeer bring everyone in the world gifts on the same night.  It is so hard to replicate that feeling of wonder and innocence when we are fighting people at Target for the last holiday Chapstick.

5.  People you love will disappoint you at Christmas.  People you don't know will disappoint you on Christmas.  They are just people and so are you and people are tired, or sad, or distracted, or didn't listen to your itemized gift list, or you get the really crappy gift in the white elephant exchange despite bringing a bottle of booze for yours.  All these things can and will happen.  Also, big deal.  You are an adult.  If you don't get what you want, go out the day after and get it.  Or stop and think if you really need it at all.

6.  Christmas brings out the best and worst in everyone.  I grew teary watching the news this morning where strangers paid off other stranger's layaway balances.  Sniff.  God bless us, every one!  I also wanted to throat punch an entire city when I ran errands the other day and almost got hit twice, shoved once, and largely ignored when needing help with an item.  Doesn't anyone work?  Why are all these people in the stores at 11am?  Bah humbug.

7.  If you are traveling, you will be delayed.  You will encounter rain, snow, ice, and things you cannot control. But, in the end, you will be in a house of merry and bright and your kids will be with cousins and you will hug people you might not get to hug again, and that makes the drive, the flight, the whatever along the way worth it.

8.  Finally, Christmas sometimes is just a day.  This year it is on a Tuesday.  Your Christmas might feel more like a Tuesday than a Christmas.  Some Christmases are like that.  It doesn't mean your heart won't grow three sizes next Friday though; warm Christmassy joy can happen year-round if you let it.

I hope it is not Scrooge-like to share these realistic truths about Christmas.  I love a lot of things about Christmas and could wax on about those, but I really think we should all face the truth about a day that is both very magical and very normal.  In our house, Bill will be home for ten days!  Magical!  The kids and I will also be here.  Normal.  Presents will be under a tree!  Magical.  Dog hair will be under furniture.  Normal.  We will laugh and play games and laugh some more.  Magical!  We will get on each other's nerves and no one will watch the movie they really want to watch. Normal.  Cookies for breakfast!  Normal.  Crunchy-fudge sandwiches for breakfast! Magical!  

May your own Christmas be both magical and normal and may you find enough warmth in your heart to let someone in during rush-hour traffic or ignore a slight, or simply be transported to childhood by some amazing smell coming from your kitchen.  For me, as soon as the melted peanut butter hits those Rice Krispies, and I smell my childhood in that bowl and watch as the kids take deep breaths and smell their childhood too, I'll know this is Christmas.  

Oh, yes.

Jingle, Jangle, Juggle

Picture it, if you will, Josh Groban’s “O Holy Night” softly streaming through the speakers on a crisp morning.  This invokes feelings of peace and joy and happiness, right?  Yes, unless it is playing in my tiny Prius as three people search, scramble and throw things around looking for a pen while yelling at each other about not being prepared.  I needed a pen to write a note for tutorials on the back of the HEB receipt we found stuck to the floor of the car and neither child had a pen or pencil in their enormous, voluminous backpacks.  They tried to turn it on me but I quickly deflected all blame and responsibility and ruined the boy’s life by actually walking him into middle school and asking the first person I saw for a pen.  

This is going to be my Christmas season this year: soft rumblings of holiday bliss in the background drowned out by the craziness of our lives.  I usually write something about pausing to enjoy the season or not getting caught up in the crazy but I am fully onboard the crazy train and I say let it rip!  Basketball games and gifts to get each week before the games?  Sure, sign me up and don’t let me know until the night before.  Winter Concerts where kids need to be there ten minutes before I get home from work?  Totally doable!  Cookies for this, beverages for that and White Elephant gifts too?  God bless us, every one. 

This is just the way life is this year and it would be silly to think that the magic of Christmas would slow things down.  I am a little sad that the busyness is creating havoc with some of our normal traditions, but I think that is part of the kids growing up and turning our lives into a whirlwind.  During one of my unemployed years, I crafted an advent calendar out of trees made from colored Christmas paper and not only did it actually turn out, the kids loved it. I know they love it and while I know that, I forgot to buy candy to put under the trees until December 2^nd.  The candy I bought didn’t fit under the trees and while trying to make it fit and doing homework with the boy and putting together lunches for the next day, I gave up.  I knocked all the little trees over, piled the candy in the middle and considered it done.  Maybe I will buy one of the nicely packaged ones from Starbucks and let my children feel the love from a giant corporation this holiday season. 

Timber!!!

 I drank so much coffee yesterday my heart hurt, but in kind of a good way, like it was finally keeping up with my brain.  Work is just as crazy as everyone is trying to cram the last few weeks of the semester in.  One of the things I do here at work is personally visit students in class with very overdue books.  They love (?) the personal attention and it helps me put a face with a name.  Yesterday, as I was running around to classes trying to hunt down overdue books, I found a kid lying unconscious in the stairwell.  It almost didn’t surprise me.  Later on this same day, a teacher yelled out to me as I was once again on the hunt that someone in her class was having a seizure and could I help?  Of course I can help.  Thinking about this later I think that all the busyness of our lives has brought me to the realization that everything and anything is going to happen every second of the day.  I don’t have to be prepared for it; I just have to go with it.  I am going to apply this to the Christmas season too.  I might not be able to stop and do all the tiny things that make used to make it enjoyable, but I can still enjoy the blur of lights as I run along.

Carol of the Girls

I have not been feeling very Christmassy or in the season or even interested much in Christmas this year.  I have not been running around crazy trying to prepare for it, I know it will all get done, so seasonal frenzy is not the cause of my indifference.  It happens sometimes, but this is usually my favorite time of the year.  Actually, now that I think about it, I didn't feel much like Thanksgiving this year either.  I think the problem might be that I miss my family, or more specifically, holiday memories of my family.

Holidays growing up were filled with aunts and uncles and cousins in too small houses that grew too warm and loud as the night went on.  It was unlimited cookies and waiting desperately for that one last family to get there so you could open your present.  It was badgering Grampa slowly and steadily until he gave in and would put "Snoopy and the Red Baron" on the record player.  (record player, I am that old).  It was too much to eat, too many cookies to choose from, too many dishes to help wash and always too loud.  Holidays were full.

Holidays here are sometimes just the four or five of us.  There is too much food, too many cookies to choose from and because I am here, it is still loud.  However, they don't always feel full.  SG and I took a walk on Thanksgiving night and we passed a house that was packed with people sitting around a dining room table and we both sighed.  I am sure it was not as idyllic inside that house as it appeared from the road, but it sure looked full.

I took the day off recently and did a big portion of our Christmas shopping.  I don't know about you, but I find that there is nothing like Christmas shopping to strip away any Christmas spirit you may have.  Luckily for me I followed it with a lunch out with my best girls.  Lunch was followed by a two dog nap which led me to finally feel that thankfulness I was missing at Thanksgiving.  If thankfulness was three weeks behind I thought I might not find my Christmas spirit until mid-January.  

But then today happened.  Today my thirteen year old woke up happy.  I don't know about your thirteen year old, but mine never wakes up happy.  She wakes up with one eye and some grumbles and crazy lion hair.  She wakes up grouchy and moody and miserable. I cannot wait until she is old enough to drink coffee and I can hand her a steaming cup and know not to talk to her until it is gone.  But today is the last day of school.  Today is parties and cookies and reindeer antlers to school.  As we were leaving for school, I said the only way I would give her a ride is if she sang Christmas carols the whole way with me.  She instantly agreed.  So we sang our hearts out to "All I Want For Christmas" at least three times.  She tried to stop me from car dancing, but once started, there is no stopping.  The look of complete horror on her face only intensified my dance.  We laughed til we cried and we sang loudly, off-key and enthusiastically. My Grinch heart grew hundred times and for the first time this season, I felt joy.  

SG and me.

Now, I am not sure I can retain this joy for the next six days, but the fact that I have some right now is enough.  I will break if off into little pieces and share it with everyone I might see today.  This way, when mine runs out, maybe someone will have some to share back.  

This ten minutes of love and laughter have made me see that I don't need to be full to be happy for the holidays; I just need to be present.  I need to see an opportunity and take it.  I need to get out of my head and go with my heart or follow others even when I don't think I feel like it.  And, no matter what, there absolutely must be more car dancing.  

Joy To My World

You know what emotion adults don't experience enough?  Joy.  Oh, we have joy on the days we are married and we are almost crushed by joy on the days our children are born, but day to day joy is hard to maintain in our busy lives.  

You put the dishes away? Hooray! Let's jump for joy!

Dogs feel joy every day.  Heck, they feel joy every ten minutes.  Owner comes home? Joy.  Food in the bowl?  Joy.  Door opened to go outside?  Joy.  What?!  A walk?!?!?  Uncontained joy making it hard to get a leash on due to excessive howling, spinning and merriment.  Well, from Bailey anyway.  Grommit (aka Eeyore) sits sullenly waiting to see if she will be leashed up too.

I am incredibly fortunate that I share my house with a nine year old boy who not only finds joy every day, but infects the rest of us with it.  Life has not been kind to my son and he has had a hard time of it since the day he was born.   Hernia repair and double eye surgery all before age two.  Delayed development due to the fact he couldn't see kept him a baby for a long time but my gosh he was a happy, happy baby.  It took him forever to reach milestones, but along the way, he smiled with his beautiful smile and laughed with a laugh that would just tickle your soul.  He brought us joy before he even brought us words.

School is hard, hard, hard for my boy and while it wears me down for him, he loves to go.  He feels he is very popular and there are cute girls to impress and off he goes each day with his Pokemons tucked under his arm and a smile on his face.  We tell each other our highs and lows each night at dinner and while he has many highs about the day, he rarely has a low.  We often say that God wrapped him in Teflon and the things that would crush the rest of us seem to bounce right off of him. His Teflon does occasionally get pierced and his sadness tears holes in my heart, but he recovers much quicker than I do and he is back to being exuberant and ready to keep going.

Sometimes his joy is misplaced and it is a struggle to get him to see what needs to be done.  He and I have been at loggerheads about homework all year.  "I did that last week" he will say and think he is done.  I will remind him he has to do it every week.  He will say "nuh-uh", and on and on until one of us is ready to pull her hair out.  He also drives his sisters crazy with his non-stop happiness and they either snap at him or let it beat them down and join him.  (I prefer the latter)  The boy with horrific vision who cannot catch a ball to save his life will tell you he is going to play for the NFL when he grows up.  Ouch says my heart.  He doesn't even play flag football because his foray into basketball one season left Bill and I crushed and depleted on the sidelines.  However, if you ask him about it, he was awesome.  And given that he can punt a football 35 yards easy, maybe he will play for the NFL.

We recently put up our Christmas decorations and he was a large help (hee hee) getting the tree up and the lights and decorations on.  Our kids have always liked to lay under the tree and look up at it and no sooner were they done decorating that he was off and running for blankets.  I am sure my daughter feels herself too old and cool to be hanging out under the tree, but she got caught up in his enthusiasm and was not only under there, but reading to him as well.  Enter Mom joy there.  Whose turn is it for the Advent calendar? He knows and informs me first thing every morning.  The boy I have to remind to put socks on each day is barrelling down the stairs and turning the tree lights on every day.  He also rushes in after school and turns them on then.  He is so excited about Christmas and about the tree and its lights, I find that I am happy because he is happy.  One morning this week we had extra time and I laid under the Christmas tree with him and we talked about the day and Pokemon and some video game and I tell you, it really lent an air of peace about my day.  Normally I tune that video game talk out, but I let him run on and on and it wasn't as painful there under the tree.

Best seat in the house.

I am sure this is probably his last year for believing in Santa and I am soaking it up.  He was very concerned wondering if Santa would still come given his bad behavior as of late.  We assured him that continued good behavior would go a long way for him and it was not too late to get off the naughty list.  He seems a little wary but has chosen to believe us.  Worry replaced with joy just a few hours later.  

We are blessed that he is joyful all year round, but I tell you, his joy is almost palpable this time of year.  The trees, the lights, the chocolate and sweets starting to pile up and the nervousness of Santa coming take his joy and turn it into pure magic.  He is so excited about the tree lights, I become excited about the tree lights.  He is laughing about something ridiculous and there is his sister laughing with him.  Dad is not feeling well but is still so caught up in listening to what he has to say because his eyes are shining and he can't get the words out fast enough.  Oh and Christmas morning!  He will not be the first one up, but he will be up in an instant when he hears his sister and will spring from the bed, smile on, feet hitting the floor and running.  He will be laughing and oohing and touching and even before he starts opening, he will be shaking.  All that joy, all that happiness, all that intensity too much to keep inside and he will shake all through opening his presents.  And we will laugh at first and then watch him some more and Bill and I will smile and feel our  hearts grow three sizes and think it is a very merry Christmas indeed.