Visual Snippets: Christmas with the dynamic duo and the Teenage WonderTwins

Son Number One stacks his presents up neatly, receiving each one with an amused murmur "wow. Thanks. That's cool" before putting them in the growing stack with embarrassment. He is obviously enjoying watching others open their present more than opening his own. A personal realization hits me: he is like me; embarrassed by his own inability to express gratitude. Saying "thank you" seems so paltry he'd rather just avoid the whole scene. I know he wishes he could open his stuff in private.

Son Number One-and-a-half receives his presents with growing amazement; he has received the same number as the other children. His "take" is no less than anyone elses (given that one of the presents can only be enjoyed by him and SNO). His face goes from strained patience to childish wonder and I am reminded that even at sixteen, he is still a little boy and all little boys and girls love to get presents.

Son Number Two gathers up his presents and attempts to carry them all at the same time downstairs. Offers of assistance are resisted. His arms are full and he cannot carry everything because his presents are all action figures and DVDs but he won't take the action figures out of the boxes yet. He wants to open them a special way downstairs... the anticipation is palpable as he tries to hurry off with his stuff. It is laughingly obvious that what he wants to do is impossible: all the presents cannot be carried by any one person while still packaged. Rather than getting frustrated, he becomes amused at his own bumbling and allows me to help him carry his booty to the stairwell. Anticipation cannot be denied, however, and he doesn't even get to the bottom step before he is setting up the boxes to be opened on the stairway. Baph tells him he may NOT clutter the stairway with his toys and PLEASE take them downstairs! He is laughing at himself as he says "okay okay!" and starts taking them one by one in a certain order down the stairs. I can hear him talking to himself about how to open the boxes once he is finished carrying them.

Son Number Three cannot decide what to play with first. He jumps from toy to toy babbling all the while. Each present fits into his imaginary world scenario Kell Payne: man of mystery! and thus he tries to fashion a storyline with each toy involved. Jumping from scene to scene as well as from toy to toy he cannot keep a linear plot and he knows it. For once, he does not care if someone is listening to him or not - the story can go on and on in many directions all at once today.

I love my family.

Tapping in the new year

What I Did To Celebrate The New Year

I played World of Warcraft. When midnight hit, Baph came over and kissed me softly.

I was not disappointed or anything about staying at home. I have a long-standing tradition of staying at home for New Year's celebrations. Mostly it's self-preservation. The celebrations are usually BIG and SCARY and EXPENSIVE.
The two times I remember doing anything special for New Years were
1) going to work (I worked at a strip club were every night was party night) and kissing my beloved in the bathroom. It was a nervous but sweet kiss and I miss having kisses like that.
2) going to a small party at The Lady's house (when she still lived with her dad) and playing board games and demon while everyone else got plastered.

This year I barely noticed it was a "special" time. Well, to me, it isn't all that special. No offense to anyone else who whooped it up because that's just MY take on it. I can party, get drunk or whoop it up whenever I want - I'm an adult and we adults can do that. I don't NEED a special day designated to get shnockered and act like I don't know what I'm doing.

The New Year is a symbolic thing, but for me, it shouldn't be ONE day, it should be a phase. I like the idea of having a definite date for moving into a new cycle of anything, but I don't like that the DAY has become a symbol of "insta-change" expectations. Change is a gradual thing that happens because the universe is big and complex, not because someone bangs a gong and says "DO OVER!"

So, my New Year's Day is not January 1. It's kind of MidWinter "whenever-christmas-madness-ends" through EarlySpring "whenever-things-seem-normal-again".

Yes, I've got new things I'd like to try, ideas to ponder and dreams to dust off and reexamine. I choose to do that over a period of time... to make any concious changes in my life REAL changes. Anything I believe I can do overnight, won't happen - this I know. So I don't make any decisions on-the-spot like that. My New Year's celebrations are actually realizations and epiphanies that I bring upon myself as a result of deliberate mental and spiritual prodding. My New Year's begins when I say "Time for a change" and my Old Year ends when I say "I think I've got that about right!"

Happy New Year.