Daddy: "Please, let me go! Don't eat me!"
Ghost of Christmas Present:: "Why would the Ghost of Christmas Present - that's me - want to eat a distasteful little miser like you?... Especially when there are so many good things to enjoy in life?"
Ahh friends, it is indeed that time of year again. Fresh new snow falling on the cedar trees that line the backyard. A husband shovels and salts the walk so no one slips on the way to work or school. A mother makes hot chocolate for after school, to warm hearts and cold hands and the days tick down as the moon reflects off of the crisp snow, all signs that Santa will soon be here.
Sounds wonderful? Sounds Christmasy? Sounds like anywhere but here. No sir, here it's beginning to look a lot mid October. It is occasionally cold and I think we have had maybe an inch and a half of snow that has now long since melted in the 8 and 9 degree temperatures that seem to keep returning. We're not complaining but it is awfully hard to get into the Christmas spirit when the weather outside is dreich.
However, we have muddled through. Particularly Isobel. She has been excited in small bursts. First picking the Christmas tree. For those keeping score, she picked a second good one in a row. We got it home and though a bit was missing from the tree stand, I improvised and it went up nonetheless. Turns out it was quite an important bit. Not only was the tree leaning like a leftist (see what I did there?) the damn thing wouldn't stay up.
"Can we decorate it now?" Izzy asked.
"Sure," I said." "We can just throw balls at it and hope they stick on. Twenty points if you can bounce it off the floor and get it on the branch."
"Really!?!" she asked.
"No," I said. "We have to get it straight.
And like a Christmas miracle, I took the majestic tree out of the stand and made the straight cut the tree man assured me had made when we bought the tannenbaum. I took up the level fir and brought it back into the house. Hosanna in the highest, the bastard fell over. And lo like the wise men of old, I went right to the Canadian tire and bought a new stand and our marriage was saved and Christmas was on again and there was much rejoicing and feasting on popcorn and the drinking of distilled spirits.
So there are a couple of Christmas ground rules I would like to set. First off, I will hang only the decorations that cannot be reached by the other members of the household. Decorating has never been my bag. It was always a means to an end. 'If I decorate this giant bit of wood, the fat man comes and puts prezzies under it. Ergo I will decorate the tree.' And as I got older- 'If I decorate the tree, my mother will be happy and I will get prezzies under the tree. Ergo, I will decorate the tree.' Now it's much easier with Izzy. She is a decoration hog and will happily decorate the tree. Mostly by herself this year. Including a great deal of the hard to reach stuff. Done and done...I think I hung all of two decorations and only because she guilted me into it.
Secondly but by far the more important of the two, under no circumstances will I pull tinsel out of the cat's ass. Anybody who has ever had a cat at Christmas time know exactly what I am talking about and why silver plastic string is an exceedingly stupid thing to hang within grazing distance of a cat. I have very clear memories of our cat running around the house looking like the Super Chief with shimmering streamers trailing behind it. I reached to pull them out and got a look from the cat that said " I will take your god-damned eyes out if you go near my ass, sonny." He trotted out of the living room looking like a disco ball and I can only assume that my mother took the tinsel out. But the rule was born that day.
But it just doesn't feel like Christmas...maybe because I am in school and have more time off than the kids do. It's very different to not be praying for the days to go quickly so I can have my four days off. It's also the first Christmas in many years that I haven't been handed a Christmas hamper or voucher or gift of some sort by an employer...but Christmas it is. I think the only real reminder I have had of it was Izzy's mangled version of the 12 days of Christmas. I will do my best to faithfully reproduce it.
On the first day of Christmas, my true love gave to me; a runny nose which is not cool. (apparently this comes from a television show but I thought it was really pretty clever so she gets the credit.)On the second day of Christmas, my true love sent to me; five crocs in a tree. (it actually sounded like five roosters in a tree but I'm willing to go out on a limb and paraphrase a little here)
On the third day of Christmas, my true love sent to me; four calling birds. (wait, what? How many?)
On the fourth day of Christmas, my true love sent to me; four...wait Daddy, I messed up.( Can't say I didn't see this one coming. She started over, sang it identically to the first time and we moved on.)
On the fifth day of sickness, my true love sent to me; five gooooooooooold riiiiiiiiings. (Don't cheer, everybody gets this one. And yes, she did sing sickness, also from the aforementioned show.)
On the eight day of Christmas my true love sent to me; eight margleflerbnern. ( I asked her what she said, she said 'I don't know the real words so I just mumbled something that was close. I asked her why she skipped three days, she said 'I just couldn't do six and seven. Not today.')
On the ninth day of Christmas, my true love sent to me; the ninth day of Christmas. (seems pretty self explanatory)
On the tenth day of Christmas, my true love sent to me; ten pipers...hey Daddy, pipers! Like bagpipers do you think? (Of course they are!)
On the eleventh day of Christmas, my true love sent to me; SOMETHING, SOMETHING, SOMETHING!
"Daddy?" she asked.
"Yep?" I replied, fully expecting to answer something about the significance of the song before she went into her big finish.
"Daddy, why is called the twelve days of Christmas when there are only eleven days in the song?"
"I have often wondered about that." I said.
As a post script, she came up to me this afternoon and said she remembered the twelfth day. It was very much like the eleventh....identical in fact.
As a parent, I am noticing that there are times when you need to bend the truth a little. So's not to damage the fragile ego of a child. Maybe a bit of writing that makes little or no sense can seem like next in line for the Pulitzer. Or a drawing that looks more like a plain mutant than a ninja turtle could be treated like it should be put in the Louvre...and sometimes you just gotta shake our head and take a step back.
Yesterday Isobel came home with something she was very excited about. A sculpture she made at school, complete with a backdrop for that ultra authentic and steeped in realism look. She said it was a holiday sculpture...she said it is a combination animals that are just right for Christmas...she said it is a cross between a beaver and a duck....
"Wait, what?" I asked.
"A beaver and a duck." she said.
"How is that a beaver and a duck?"
"See, there's his teeth" she said.
"OK." I said.
Even Mrs. Narrator, the great extrapolator and equalizer had to scratch her head.
"A beaver and a duck?"
"Yep." said Izzy.
"What are those, then?" asked Mrs. Narrator, point at three spiky things sticking on the side of the holiday mystery.
"Those are his spikes." said Izzy.
"Oh, OK."I love my kids, I encourage healthy expression of all kinds. I am absolutely flummoxed by this. Ladies and gentlemen, without further ado, if you gaze to your right you will behold the Christmas What The F#*k in all of its unnatural glory. Brilliant and creative...but a duck-beaver it ain't.
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