This is a picture of the beautiful, letterpressed Christmas cards I ordered on Etsy (and the White Violin from The Umbrella Academy, she lives on the window sill). This is also a picture I took roughly 20 minutes ago after having cracked the seal on these beautiful Christmas cards that were not sent out. Maybe next year.

This is my wish for you, darling ones, a life so full that you run out of time to send out Christmas cards. Along with that, I wish you the confidence and sense of self-worth not to feel guilty about not sending out those cards.

I also wish you family gatherings filled with so much laughter that your cousin Billy makes wine come out of Sister #2’s nose. I hope you are surrounded with people who laugh so much so long and so loud that you can even hear it in the garage.

I also wish for you one person who will change out of their pajamas for you, a year full of serendipity, and a source of comfort.

Merry Christmas, darling ones.

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I wish you times in your life that are so filled with people and activity that it takes you nearly an entire day to recover. A time where you are so busy living your life that you don’t find to write about it until much later than you had planned.

I wish you the kind of satisfaction that comes with watching the people you opened your home to enjoying themselves. I hope that at some point in your life you can watch a four-year-old boy unwrap gifts with his eyes squeezed shut because he wants to prolong the anticipation just a few more seconds.

I still wish for you at least one person in your life who will change out of their pajamas for you and a year full of serendipity.

Also, beautiful sugar bowls and gravy boats.

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I still wish for all of you at least one person in your life who will change out of their pajamas so you don’t have to go see a cute boy’s band play alone.

This year I wish for you the obvious an education, family, friends, and a life that is full of the unexpected. Be sure to make mistakes, make a lot of them, because there is no better way to learn and to grow. All right?

Oh wait. That’s Jen’s dying speech for her daughter. I wish for you to always have an emotional security blanket that you can turn to whenever you are lonely or scared, whether it is Dawson’s Creek or the music of Matthew Sweet. I hope that you have something that will comfort you when you need it.

I also wish for you to always be surrounded by a circle of supportive people. I have had without a doubt the worst two months of my life thus far.

Holy Shit! This sappy post about friends and blah blah is going to be rudely interrupted by HOLY SHIT.

So I’m sitting here typing, bawling my head off, feeling all schmoopy, with Jeopardy on in the background. Then one of those homemade local commercials come on and the voice stops my fingers on their keys. There in front of me on the TV is a dude that I slept with 1000 years ago. Yeah. Wow. I haven’t thought about that one-night-stand in 999 years.

Huh. So yes, darling ones, I wish for you many things. Most of all I wish for you a year full of serendipitous moments that make you laugh at the wonder of it all.

Merry Christmas.

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Two days of cleaning, a day and a half of cooking, a gallon each of homemade soup and chili, dusted bookcases and I was practically stood up. Yeah. No aunts or uncles or cousins. One set called in sick, another called in apathetic, another was just MIA. My sisters (sans Sister #2 who was in WI with the in-laws) and my mom came, but that’s it.

All that work for naught.

My family was impressed by the spread and the cleanliness of my abode. But they totally agreed that I worked my ass off for nothing. We’re the type of family you don’t have to clean for.

You would think that with the reduced guest list I would be spared the awkward dating/marriage questions, but then you would be wrong.

Right around dinner time four-year-old Nolan came marching down the stairs calling my name.

“Jodi, Jodi.” He stopped halfway down the stairs when he saw me come around the corner.
“What?” I asked.
He lifted his hand up, palm out. “How come you don’t got kids?”

I turned my head to look at Sister #3, his mom, who thinks it’s about high time I have some kids because she wants a new baby to cuddle.
“What?” she asked. “I didn’t put him up to it!”

I walked over to the La-Z-Grrl and sat down. Nolie was on my heels. “How come you don’t got kids?” he asked again.
“It’s a long story.”
“Why should she have kids?” Sister #3 asked.
“Because then she’d have good toys!”

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When I was a kid growing up in Blaine, there was a house not far from where we lived that had one of those amazing and ostentatious holiday light displays. Whenever we were heading home on Highway 65 from wherever we were, we would beg Mom to drive past the house. She would never answer our pleas but when she took the left at Blainbrook that headed towards John and Eileen’s house instead of the right that went to our house, we knew where we were going.

She’d drive slowly down the street and tell us about the display.

“The man who lives there has a daughter,” Mom said. “When she was a teenager she went blind, and that’s when he started making the Christmas display. Each year he adds more and more lights because he hopes he can make it bright enough for her to see.”

I have no idea if that story is true or not. I don’t even know how my mom would have known that bit of information. But when I was younger I thought it was the sweetest and most tragic thing I’d ever heard. Maybe that’s why the light display seemed so magical and now they all just seem kind of crass.

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