Sara and Lainey- Christmas 2008
From time to time my boss, Michael will talk about his two youngsters growing up too fast. I still remember when the older of the two little ones started kindergarten. He genuinely seemed sad that she would no longer get to stay at home with her mom day after day and play games, bake cookies and take trips to the grocery store with her.
I laughed at him then but now I almost understand where he’s coming from. Like me, Michael is a big kid at heart. In fact, our office antics are legendary. Every day we’re playing a different joke on one another, telling a different funny story even secretly planning a prank to top the other’s last.
Michael instills this childlike spirit in his children. Evidence of it is littered in his stories and I see it in his little boy every time he comes to visit in the office. The first thing his son, David always wants to do is wrestle, fart on me or play with something fragile off my desk. He’s simply a perfect little, carefree version of his dad.
I was looking down at Lainey this morning, lying in bed beside me while her mother took a shower, and I felt a little bit of Michael’s sadness. It wasn’t that I was sad she was already a month old in the blink of an eye (actually, I can’t wait for her to get a little older), it was that I only had a few short years until she would be off to school too, taking on responsibilities of her own. No more endless play time or carefree afternoon naps.
It’s hard to watch children gradually lose that innocence they have almost naturally. It’s just plain fun to see kids who are so energetic, playful and in love with life like Michael’s kids are. Every decent person wants that for their child and I want that for my child too. In Michael’s children, the spirit almost seems amplified. It is almost as if they know no other emotions either than love and happiness. I genuinely think it is a direct result of his joyous spirit and attitude. In fact, the man can be so joyous that I think he secretly wishes he could go back to believing in Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny too.
Honestly, sometimes I wish I could believe again too…
So tonight, I’ll start a new tradition with Lainey and Sara. It’s been a rough holiday thus far, but things are going to get better. Tonight, I plan to crawl up in the attic and do something I haven’t done over the past few years. I’m going to pull down our stiff, acrylic Christmas tree, the tangled lights and dusty ornaments and the three of us are going to decorate that meager artificial pine tree to the best of our ability.
I know Lainey is too young to know what is going on, but Sara and I will get to have our fun. And hopefully it will be the start of our lifelong tradition of passing on as much laughter, happiness and a pure passion for simply being alive that we can.
I do not want her to simply live life, I want her to eat, drink and breathe it. I want her to be enveloped in it and I hope that she loves and enjoys it as much as I love and enjoy her. Then hopefully she will grow up to be a better person than I or her mother ever dreamed of being… and maybe cure cancer or do something else awesome like that.
So cheers to happiness, health, cheesy decorations and maybe a little fruit cake.
Merry Christmas.
December 26th, 2008 at 2:30 am
How about being a good father and getting a real tree jerk!! Just kidding Merry Christmas.
January 10th, 2009 at 11:05 pm
And I thought my kids got all that joie de vivre from me!