Izzy's Fireside chat...Santa Claus is back in town

It was a bright sunny day and she was looking up at the skin and getting upset.
Isobel: "Arrggh!"
Daddy: "What's the matter?"
Isobel: "I can't see the sun, my eyes keep closing."
Daddy: "You can't look at the sun, honey. Not with just your eyes. You'll burn out your retinas."
Isobel: "What's your retinas?"
Daddy: "Tough to explain. Part of your eye."
Isobel: "What if you wore sunglasses?"
Daddy: "Not dark enough. The only thing that would be dark enough is a welder's mask. You could look at the sun through a welders mask and not hurt your eyes."
Isobel: "A welder's mask would be dark enough?"
Daddy: "Yep."
Isobel: "Daddy?"
Daddy: "Yep?"
Isobel : "Are there lots of welders on the sun?"


The heat has finally broken for more than a day at a time, which means that Isobel now delights in her favourite Fall activity. Bugging me to light a fire in the backyard fire pit. I finally relented this past weekend and the two of us sat out there by the fire. Talking and waving off smoke and smelling like hot dogs.
She began slowly to inch close and closer to the pit. I told her to move back.
"But I'm cold," she said. "And sitting this close is warming me up."
"If a spark jumps out and lands on your leg, you'll soon warm up." I said trying to sound scary and dramatic.
"Good," she replied. I'm freezing."
"Seriously," I said. "Move back a little. "I don't want you to get burnt if a spark pops out."
"It will hurt like H?" she asked.
"Hurt like H?" I asked. "You mean hurt like hell? Yes. It will hurt like hell."
"Daddy," she said. "Don't say that, it's a bad word."
"I don't care if you say hell around here." I said.
"I know," she replied. "But I can't say it anywhere else so I don't want to say them anymore."
I thought this over a while, this was pretty impressive and awfully self aware. Even for her.
"OK Pick," I said. "If saying those words is bothering you, don't say them anymore. I will try not to say them either."
"Really?" she asked sounding rather amazed at the prospect of me not swearing.
"Really. If it bothers you I will try not to do it."
"OK!" she exclaimed. "No more swearing then."
"OK, I'll try my hardest." I said.
"Except the 'F' word." she said.
"What!!?!?" I asked.
"Yeah, I'll probably still say Fuck once a week."
I got up to get more wood for the fire and she came with me to help.
"Daddy?" she began.
"Yep?"
"Daddy, I love you."
"I love you too, Pick." I said a little taken aback. It's not that we don't love the children or they us, it's just those three words are only generally thrown about liberally when someone is after something large and/or expensive.
"No seriously," she went on. "I really love you."
"I love you too." I said now quite baffled by this out pouring of emotion.
"Can I have a hug?" she asked me kind of sheepishly.
"Of course you can have a hug. " I said. I have to admit I was a little choked up by all of this. She hadn't been this affectionate with me since she was very little and I kind of missed it. As I bent down to hug her, she put her arms around my neck in a warm embrace. I instantly smelled it.
"Augh!" I choked. "What is that. Was that you?"
"I fahted." she said and exploded with fits of giggling.
"You're rotten." I said. "A healthy girl shouldn't smell like that." I tried to pull my head away from the stench. She giggled louder and hugged my neck tighter...Are you sure FDR ended his fireside chats this way?


For those of you intrepid readers who have been with us a while, I am happy to report that Isobel and Santa have ended their feud and are like peas and carrots again. I must admit I wasn't privy to the whole reason why they were at loggerheads in the first place but she suddenly stopped playing with him after a long spate of him being with her every minute of the day.
"Where's Santa?" I asked her one day after not seeing him for a while.
"Santa is stupid." she said.
"Why is Santa stupid? " I asked unwittingly.
"He just is, alright? Can I go now?"
I knew this was something more serious than her usual spats with the jolly old elf. In her mind anyway. I am noticing the thing-the downside if you will, of having a massive imaginary world as she does, are the politics and intricacies of relationships and how they can sour on so many levels. It's hard to keep up. It's all very real to her and so to us too. And god-dammit, most of the time it's hysterical...you can't make this stuff up.
It had been a couple of months since had paid any attention to Santa at all, even though he had been riding around in my car since their fight. I was going to the States and needed to clean out my car. I thought for a moment of leaving him in the car but thought I might have a little difficulty explaining to the border guard why a grown many is riding around with a dancing, rump shaking Santa who sings 'Y'all ready fo this?'
"Well you see sir, I have this little girl who has this gigantic imaginary world where she is a benevolent dictator and Santa is her chief lieutenant...but they are fighting at the moment and so she banished him to the colonies...and since I was heading that way for the weekend, she stuffed him in with me and hoped I could drop him off at the first gulag I found...and that is the truth of it sir." I can hear the rubber gloves snapping now.
So she was in the garage with me a week ago and low and behold she laid eyes on Kris Kringle and I thought she might weep.
"Santa!" she hollered.
She picked him up and rained kisses in his ever smiling, cotton bearded face. She hugged him for an hour, it seemed and when she finally released him she introduced him to 'Tumbles'. This is the new mechanical toy in her ever growing stable of things that whizz and whirr and move with life like precision. he was also seemingly, Santa's successor. Santa and Tumbles embraced as all political rivals do to keep up their public appearances and off they trundled with their leader. My daughter.
She had asked to play in my car, which nowadays actually means on my car. I told her she could and off they went. A short while later, I went to get her to go inside for lunch. There she sat on the roof of my car. Tumbles in her lap and Santa at her right hand. She muttered something to Tumbles and gave him a giant hug. 'I love you' followed thereafter. After a few moments had passed, she turned to Santa and pointed her finger at his face in a stern and forceful manner. "DON"T!" she hissed at him...I sense an imminent coup...