How kids ruin Christmas

If you're anywhere close to my age, twenty four for the fifth consecutive year, you probably only vaguely remember being excited on Christmas morning. But somewhere, somehow, you can still remember waking up early, your stomach full of butterflies, wiping the sleep from your eyes, and walking into a room full of presents. Presents, some big, some small, all filled with unknown treasures. It was like wandering in to some undiscovered country, seeing everything as if for the first time. You can maybe remember shaking a present, hoping somehow to pierce the veil of wrapping paper to see what was inside.

That's pretty much the Christmas experience, give or take a few family traditions. And then, you start to get older. You start to make Christmas lists and expect certain gifts. You don't play with your toys right away. You say thank you and comment on the fine stitching that was clearly put in to your new pair of socks. Or you say, "I'll be able to wear this nice sweater at my new job." In short, Christmas dies, but you don't openly mourn its passing.

And you're fine with that. You still have your familial traditions to go home to, and a few presents that tickle your fancy. Perhaps a book you haven't read, you're okay. And then...And then your siblings start having babies. And you, poor childless soul that you are, do not even get your paltry pile of presents. No, instead you get to watch the children's joy.

It's probably an unpopular opinion to take. However, deep down, I think we all sort of know that it's true. It's probably fair to say that kids ruin everything. It's of course, an incredibly complex sort of ruining. The sort of ruining that (hopefully) winds up turning you into a less selfish and more compassionate human being. However, let's not celebrate that right now. Right now let's just focus on how kids ruin Christmas shall we?

Problems with kids at Christmas

1) The joy at playing with a new gift. You've accepted by now that your joy will be muted at the Holiday season. However, rather than experiencing Christmas vicariously through the children, you begin to realize how much you have lost. It's kind of like the occasional surprise I get when looking in a mirror, and I wonder who the hell that old stranger looking back at me is. But all these little rapscallions remind you of is that you were a child once, that you looked forward to things. And these kids still have years and years ahead of them. Years in which Christmas will begin to take on the near mythic status it had in your childhood. They will wake up your sibling and their spouse at seven in the morning, too giddy to think of anything else. They will push trucks and trains across the floor. They will tie bows in the hair of dolls, and squeal with delight at getting everything they could possibly want all wrapped up in a cardboard box.

And they believe in Santa. Kids believe in Santa. Is this a good thing? No, this is a sort mind-bogglingly destructive thing. That you've taken your hard-earned salary and bought them something, and they are crediting it to a fat white-bearded man who lives at the North Pole. If kids had any real fortitude they'd see through the mystery and offer you a great big hug. Do they? No. They don't. They continue to believe in Santa until at least (was it third or fourth grade mom?). Not because they really believe in Santa, but as far as I can tell, merely to spite you.

Some counter actions:
1a) Play with your new gift as though it is the finest thing you have ever received. Put on a new T-shirt and walk around the room making everyone feel the fine stitching that went into its construction. Accidentally, kick over the kids new trains. Feign that it was accidental. Suggest that they go to bed so that the grown ups can enjoy themselves. Pretend as though it is a joke. Mention it again two minutes later.

1b) Insist that everyone offer special words of Christmas thanks for each gift they receive. Accuse the young children incapable of speech of ungratefulness. Pretend to evict them from Christmas. Evict them from Christmas.

1C) Offer to open all of your nephew/nieces presents. "Show" them how to play with each toy. Say that you have to go to the bathroom. Claim you're suffering from a urinary tract infection. Take each of the toys back to your room and demand that your wife re-wrap them. Force her into having a second Christmas where you open the stolen toys. Give them away to some less fortunate kids to avoid suspicion. If the matter comes up again, point out that you never cried when you didn't get the toys you wanted.

1D) Wear a Santa outfit to Christmas. Fake your own death while choking on a cookie. Let your dying words be something alone the lines of, "It's because you don't love your parents enough. Mention college scholarships as a great idea.

2) The presents. A lot of people will tell you that seeing the childish joy in opening presents is worth it's weight in gold. They are wrong. Kids, as is often joked, but really no one realized how truly awful this is, would rather play with the bubble wrap than their gift. So while you're sitting in a corner watching the large mound of presents dwindle without with your name on nary a present you realize that something in the universe has gone horribly wrong. This child. This small, unappreciative thing has out-presented you by a distance that you could not have imagined in your own distant childhood.


And they don't appreciate it! At best, they play with the toy for a few hours, and perhaps develop an affinity for it. But that doesn't really help either. (See above). No, these feckless and lazy drooling little things have run away with your family Christmas! No more do you awkwardly open presents in silence, and wonder how much money will be in your check this year, no, you sit around and attend to the needs of the young. They poop and pee and cry their way through the Holidays.

Meanwhile, you, who may in this case be me, slowly come to realize that Christmas will never be the same. Someday you'll have kids of your own who will wake you up with excitement in their little voices when you're just excited for the chance to sleep in two days in a row since you don't have to go into the office. And you'll wake up and dutifully watch them open presents wondering when the universe got all turned upside down and you stopped being at its very center. And you're happy for them. Of course you're happy for them.

Aside: My siblings kids are quite lovely and the above is intended for comedic purposes only. I would not trade any drop of drool on my shoulder, even if was for an X-Box 360. It was just sort of strange to experience second-hand, what I imagine parents experience first hand on a daily basis, suddenly this little thing pretty much controls almost all of your thoughts and actions. It's not a bad or a good thing. It's just a thing. It's just something that happens. However, that doesn't mean that you can't have a nice time saying things like kids ruined Christmas because they do remind you of all the years that have been left behind, and how things have changed irrevocably and will never be the same. They are a little ever-evolving reminder that life is passing by. That it has more to with cycles than your linear progression towards. Well? Towards what? I don't know. That's why a circle is a shape, and a line isn't. A line is one dimensional. A circle possesses the beauty of complexity. Lines interacting with one another, forming into a shape. Something more complete.

For little Caleb, Anna, and Joseph. I miss you all!