Watching the ball drop

Two and Two A, and Three and Three A are going to the Big Apple to see the ball drop in Times Square on New Year’s Eve.

I miss them.

I miss them and I want to go with them.

One day we’re all together laughing, eating, drinking, opening Christmas presents and the next day they are off pursuing their own bucket lists.

It is bittersweet.

Bitter hbecause I miss them as I have said.

Bitter because I am envious and want to go with them.

Sweet because I would like to think that I have inspired them with my own dreams.

Like the Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young song (Teach Your Children) goes…”and feed them on your dreams…the ones they pick’s…the one you’ll know by”.

Yes they were in ships in safe harbor with us at home but that’s not what ships are made for!

So, I’ll have to feast on their dreams realized when I see them again.

In the mean time I’m sledding down Mt. Lucy off the back deck in a cardboard box with Nine!

She says I’m the most fun adult she knows and she loves me.

Thank God for our big brood. The are my compass.big

Ahhhh Christmas at last!

I love Christmas morning at our house!

Growing up my family always opened Christmas presents on Christmas eve but I always wanted to open presents on Christmas morning like in the classic Christmas movies.

We have always opened gifts on Christmas morning and what a blessing it has been to watch our gathering grow.

What started out as just two of us has grown to sixteen counting 1, 2, and 3A’s.

We always start with the picture of the family on the stairs – many in their PJ’s.

When we had three, four, then seven, they often wore matching PJ’s just for the occasion.

Then we open presents by the tree.

That amazing Santa color codes everybody’s wrapping paper so you know just which presents belong to you.

The starting with the youngest and moving to oldest everyone opens a present while we all watch on.

It took three and a half hours this year!

There’s lots of food too.

This year Two, Two A, Three and Four made Mom cry when they gave her a necklace with an “L” for Lucy and a baby’s foot.

I was very pleased with my gifts…especially new running shoes.

Five received the Detox patch (as advertised on TV). Something she could use after a rollicking time at college!

Being the anal one I spent half an hour organizing the garbage and recycling. We have filled seven garbage cans and five recycling bins and garbage day isn’t for three days.

The night before Christmas

Christmas is always special at our house!

How could it not with so many people plus friends!

Thankfully, we’ve always had children around to infect us with their wonder and amazement!

For the record we opened presents from others on Christmas eve saving the good gifts from Santa and each other for Christmas morning.

Seven opened a microscope and set about to analyze his urine! No kidding. The gross out of this Christmas.

A couple years ago he wrapped his own belongings and gave them to everybody.

He found an assortment of all occasion cards in the basement and used them as gift tags.

You might get one that said “Get well soon” or “Happy Anniversary” or even “Congratulations on your new promotion!”

Other years we would read Seven’s letter to Santa pronouncing all his misspelled words.

One year we thought Eleven may be autistic but it turned out she wasn’t. Seven wrote on her greeting card, “Merry Christmas…I wish you were Autistic!”

How do people celebrate Christmas with out kids like ours?

After presents we ate with some good friends.

Nine sang in a candlelight service that we all attended to really get us in the mood.

Then we rushed to Two and Two A’s church for their candlelight service.

What fun at a small church where the pastor plays guitar and is one fourth of the worship team.

Where else can you request Christmas Carols from the audience?

We’ve celebrated Christmas this year in a mega church, a large church and a small church. All fun. All great reminders of the reason for the season.

Oh yeah….I was reminded that I knew so many of the classic Christmas carols…because I’m old…and because when I was in public elementary school we could sing the ones that reference Jesus, God and the savior.

I’m not sure what Seven will be analyzing tomorrow but we’re making him carry around a bottle of hand sanitizer.

Feeling other’s pain

The unexamined life is not worth living…so says Socrates.

Never been my problem.

How many of life’s sayings just sit there…out there…on our tongues.

We have hear them…used them…but not usually understood them.

One of us has messed up.

And I really do feel her pain.

I’m not making excuses.

She owns the screw-up 100%

But I really do feel some of the pain.

Maybe we all do.

Maybe that’s not all bad.

Maybe that is the catalyst for accountability?

Is Santa lonely?

Well I was when I was conned into playing the jolly old elf.

My dear wife.

The one who said, “all the parents dress up on Halloween and go to their kid’s school”.

The one who conned me into dressing up like a giant penguin recently.

Volunteered me for a friend’s porch caroling party.

The suit was top-notch – an award winner, borrowed from an award-winning costume expert.

The kids loved this Santa – so they say.

Nine, Ten and Eleven were confused.

And now I have another previous occupation I can add to my resume!

But here’s the lonely part.

After the children all told me what they wanted…

After I (Santa) posed with every child for a family photo…

After I had waved to every passing car, jogger, and pedestrian…

I was standing out in the cold while the other adults drank hot cider and cocoa.

In adult circles, Santa is a freak.

Who ever heard of sitting down for a frosty cold one with Santa?

Or telling jokes around a bond fire with the guy in the fake white beard?

And Santa is one guy who could use the company of others.

I mean several kids expected me to know their names and even what they wanted for Christmas.

When I asked one kid what he wanted he smirked “I already told you at Macey’s!”

Then another kid, bent on vengeance, kept telling me other kid’s sins and shortcomings in hopes that I would move his enemies to my naughty list.

And being Ho Ho happy is hard work. I almost lost my voice and I felt like the village idiot Ho Ho-ing at everything everybody said.

Yes being Santa is lonely and hard work. Then everybody forgets about you for eleven months.

Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus, but I’m glad I’m not he all the time.

At least 100 but who’s counting?

I saw two back-to-back children’s Christmas performances today.

Seen one…seen a hundred.

Scrubbed faces. Party dresses. First tie…very uncomfortable.

Always some kid picking his nose the whole time or doing an Elvis impression without even knowing “The King”.

Everybody laughs…except his parents.

Never was one of our child thankfully.

Our angels, Nine and Eleven were just that…angels.

Sometimes I think we have these kids so we can justify all the expensive photographic equipment.

Or maybe it is for the teachers to show us taxpayers what they have been doing all year.

Or maybe it is to launch these little angels on a life that will place them on one side of the stage or the other.

Christmas or whatever holiday is only secondary…it is the growing up process.

It’s bitter-sweet.

We let go a little but today.

But they say the only way to hold on to something is to be willing to let it go.

Henry Havelock Ellis once said “All the art of living lies in a fine mingling of letting go and holding on.”

I think that’s true.

He’s gone but not forgotten…

That was a trick headline…a carryover from my Yellow Journalism days.

Bet you didn’t know I worked for an underground newspaper when I was in college.

Anyway…Seven is at school but I feel like he is still in the vicinity.

I get in the car I used to chauffeur him to school and I could swear he was with me.

Ah Ha!

It’s the dollar store deodorant I bought him the other night.

Note to self…not everything you get at the dollar store is a bargain.

I tell him he smells…well…like a locker room.

He says maybe he should switch to cologne.

Why?

Because all the guys at school do.

We all know the parental response to this one – right!

In fact, he says, some people asked me where I got the great smelling new cologne.

You didn’t tell them did you?

Sure – Macey’s.

Whew!

Well, maybe we should invest a few more bucks and get Seven some deodorant that is a little tamer.

Just another day in the life of the warden of the family asylum.

My life as a linguist

Did you know I am a linguist?

A linguist is one who speaks several languages fluently.

If you know me this may come as a surprise. You thought I only knew American English and a little bit of pig Latin.

Hah!

The bible says in John 10:27: “My sheep listen to my voice; I know them and they follow me”

I live a backwards version of this verse. “It goes something like this: I listen to my sheep; I understand their language and I can serve and communicate with them”.

Confused? Let me explain.

Six has braces and a lot of other things going on in her sinus region. To make maters worse she speaks very fast (probably because so many people are speaking at once in our family). I am around her the most so I often find myself translating for others. I speak Six.

Seven is autistic. He doesn’t always say what he means. I usually understand what he means because I understand him. It’s a gift. I speak Seven.

Ten is a creature of habit and order. She eats pasta at most meals…served in a special yellow bowl…with the “Tony the Tiger” spoon only “Tony” is worn off. I can pick the right spoon out of a sea of many similar looking spoons.

When these criteria are not men she usually throws herself on the floor.

I speak 10.

If eleven doesn’t like what is for dinner she heads for the bathroom where she spits out dinner in the waste basket. Those of us who speak her language usually head her off to be sure she swallows before entering the powder room.

I speak Eleven.

Eight is a people pleaser. She also has an unquenchable appetite. She will say she likes everything we serve for dinner but if it doesn’t vanish from her plate in 30 seconds then we know she is not be forthright.

I speak Eight.

I think I speak everyone’s language.

It’s a gift.

A gift to be a linguist…and to have so many people I love around me that I have developed this occupational vocation.

Hey – another skill for the resume!

Juice and coffee remembered

Long ago I had the habit of rising early for coffee and quiet time.

My quiet time was shattered by a little girl who came to drink her morning juice and share my quiet time…that was quiet no longer.

That’s OK because juice and coffee with Dad was far better than my solitary QT.

We’ve had juice and coffee time many times since then, even when neither juice nor coffee was present.

It was our code language for “we need to talk”.

This is how we discussed the major events facing Two…events that I was privileged to offer a father’s advice.

There’s a new kid on the block for J & C.

I love having a second chance at the best things in life.

It’s Nine.

Today she asked if I was “ever lonely”.

It turns out nobody will play with her at recess.

This is the stage where the problems are easy to solve. Not like “Dad, I think I want to get married”.

We discussed it.

We prayed about it…I already said grace she said…this is a different thing to pray for, honey.

I’ll secretly ask the advice of an expert on this one – Mom.

It’s a wonderful life…usually.

She speaks my (love) language

Words of affirmation is my love language (The 5 Love Languages by Gary Chapman).

Apparently Nine speaks this love language fluently.

I could bring her along as a translator.

Examples:

Friday is Fun Lunch Day at her school. Parent’s get a break and the kids get a special lunch catered.

So on the way home last Fun Lunch day I ask Nine, “So how was Fun Lunch today?”

“Bad!”

Bad? Why?” I ask.

“Because you didn’t make it!”

Choke.

Last night Nine had a play date at a school friend’s home. She stayed for dinner.

Now this friend’s mother owns a restaurant in town and cooks all the food.

I was wishing I could have accompanied her to the play date or at least to dinner.

Again our conversation of the way home…

“So, how was dinner?”

“OK”

“Just OK?” “Why just OK?” I ask.

“You didn’t make it!” she giggles.

I am sitting in the waiting room at the UIC Ortho Clinic as I write this, sobbing like a fool. The people around me must think I am worried about a root canal or some other horrible dental problem.

I believe one way God hugs us is through the arms and words of each other. How beautiful that God would use this sweet child to bless me.

When we realize that we can be a blessing to each other, we can experience that peace that surpasses all understanding.

I am blessed and I pray that these posts can be a blessing to you.