Family Christmasesesesesess

"IT'S JUST WHAT I WANTED!!!!!"

My niece exclaims this, followed by a high-pitched squeal, after tearing open each present on X-Mas morning. She sounds like a little cartoon mouse, amplified. There is pink princess shit strewn about my sister's living room floor, as far as the eye can see...or at least to the end of the room in every direction. it's a mire of shiny paper.

"Uncoo Josh, WOOK!", she says, "Pwincesses!"

she's very nearly screaming this at me.

It's all very adorable.

And she is very adorable -- wearing her little purple dress that she picked out herself -- her blonde streaked hair shiny and sitting atop her head like a some soft helmet. she has some dried fluid of some sort crusting above her upper lip...and her eyes are gleaming brown and bright.
She's in a state of controlled hysteria, moving from one toy to the next, playing with each one at lightning speed, and then moving on to the next...for as long as her attention span can muster.

I chuckle as I take it all in.
This is what the adults were talking about when I overheard them say, "Christmas is for the kids."
I don't know exactly when I heard them say that, but it stuck with me, whenever it was.
And perhaps they were right.

I'm sitting there with my mom, Andrea, her mom, my dad, his girlfriend, my sister (who is also a mom), her husband, their kids, and a partridge in a pear tree.

Christmas breakfast takes on a new meaning this year -- Andrea is very pregnant now -- 26 weeks to be exact. Our first child is on the way...coming fast, approaching like a freight train, and in very short time, she'll surely be screaming at us about princess shit, too.

It's our first Christmas together, and it's lovely.

But, MAN! How and when did this all happen?

It's the time of year for fond, if not exhausted, nostalgic reflection.
And so, I reflect...against my own better judgment.

Man. How and when did we become so grown up?

My Mom and Dad look noticeably older these days...but they're holding up well, considering their advancing age.
Their age is showing, though.
I hear them talk often of their retirement plans.

My sister is struggling to open one of Rachael's new toys...cursing under her breath at the difficulty of loosening the plastic pieces from the plastic container. She and her husband are selling their house, and buying a new one.

They're engulfed in a world of real estate agents and staging and showings and such.

We all sit around the breakfast table, munching on a delicious spread.
We're talking about politics and travel and school districts and shit.

Man. We ARE grown up now, aren't we?
I'm not sure how or when it happened, but the time went by, and we've arrived at this very adult place, watching the little ones open their toys, and discussing important things about Mitt Romney and a used Subaru that we just purchased.

Andrea and I open gifts -- no princess shit for us.
We unwrap soft, plush BABY shit...mobiles and tiny clothes and playpen things and a book about the 'first year'.
I suspect that first year will be a long one.

I'd be concerned if my head weren't spinning.

And it is. But I'm realizing that it feels good, the spinning. It's not that chaotic and woozy kind of rotation. It's rather soothing and tingly. I wonder if this is what my parents felt like when they were in my shoes, way back when.
But it doesn't really matter. I feel it now. It feels all together surreal, and quite magical.

Against my better judgment, once again, in the midst of my reflection -- I ask myself, "Where did the time go?"
It's a cliched and age old question, sure. But it seems to me a very valid one during this family Christmas brunch.

It's the merging of two families now -- our dysfunction combined with one another's, so as that we're only bound to function at a relatively higher level of dysfunction than we did previously, I suspect.
I hope.

Regardless of what any of it means, with the coming of a new life, a proverbial torch has been passed on.

I am seeing what my parents once saw, and what their parents had seen before them, and their parents too, and so on.
And it's all relatively...comfortable. Amazing.

I reflect and I decide that Christmas isn't JUST for the kids at all -- but I have to give credit where credit is due.
My niece is a conduit for powerful insight regarding the precious sanctity of family.
I could tell her, but she wouldn't care.
She tells me that she wants more presents. She wants more princess shit. It's very adorable.

Families evolve.
The older generations fade and pass away, the newer ones grow until they, eventually, do the same.
And the seasons they go 'round and 'round.

I'm grateful for my family...for the old one, and this newer one, too. I'm grateful for the merging of the two. I know that this one will merge with another some day, and I hope that I'll be around to see it, in some similar and new way to the way that I've seen it all today.

It ain't so bad being a grown up. The next big birthday that I'll be experiencing will be my 40th. I mention it to Andrea, and we both realize that we, and all the friends we know, will still likely be as weird as ever...if not just a little bit older.

As I look at her and her fast-growing tummy, I smile and feel soft and light and spinny.

I scream to myself -- "IT'S JUST WHAT I WANTED!!!"