our children decent-looking and smiling in front of a camera? Getting six children to sit still for.2 seconds is not as easy as it seems. Then I’d need to find a stand-in for my daughter, who is never around, and spend hours Photoshopping her face onto the surrogate, not to mention Photoshopping out somebody’s pinkeye infection and the bunny ears Peik made behind Truman’s head. The entire process is just so exhausting. I have yet to organize a database of addresses, so even if I did have the wherewithal to get a card made, I doubt it would actually be sent out. I have a friend who never sends me a card for Christmas, but instead sends one on Valentine’s Day. It’s a brilliant idea; not only does she have an extra six weeks of downtime to execute this thankless task, but the card arrives after the chaos of the holidays and I actually have a moment to enjoy it. I am seriously considering Arbor Day cards.
During the countdown to Christmas break, four backpacks enter my home every day, chock-full of announcements of school fund-raisers, recitals, end-of-trimester parent-teacher conferences (why does a preschooler need a conference?), and birthday party invitations (“I hope Truman can make it, it’s sooo hard for Christian to have a Christmastime birthday”)—a constant stream of paper working its way into my house, bent and creased and greasy and each single piece expressing its claim to a pound of my flesh. And then there are all the “Winter Solstice” events at Larson’s international preschool, because God forbid Christmas should take up all of our attention: we also have to find time each December to teach our children to be tolerant of others. Don’t even get me started on all the tipping and gifting—of teachers, teachers’ aides, teachers’ assistants, nannies, mannies, therapists, parking garage attendants, postal delivery facilitators (formerly known as “mailmen”), secret Santas, and class moms. My bank is broken along with my spirit of giving.
How did spreading holiday cheer become women’s work? How many men actually make it to a holiday singalong past pre-k? And of the few who do, is it even remotely possible that they have sewn some sequins on Mary’s blue headdress or run down to the 99-cent store the morning of the big show, praying that there are three fuzzy Santa hats left?
During this hundred-yard dash to the five-minute finish line of opening presents on Christmas morning, all children lose what shreds of common sense they might have had the month before. They may spend eleven months of the year jockeying for position on my favorite-child list, but come November 30 they are gaming Santa, even the ones who no longer believe. Like most parents with children hopped up on snowman-shaped cookies and dreams of the latest iPod, Peter and I wield the old fat man like a cudgel. Every other sentence out of my mouth is a shouted “Santa’s watching you!” After many repetitions of this threat, I sometimes have to take myself into the bathroom and soak my face in a sink full of ice water to keep from going insane. Who am I? How did I become this harpy, demanding that my children answer to a fictitious red-and-white executioner?
As if all of the above weren’t enough, in the middle of the month my children are handed over to me for twenty days of “school break,” backpacks now stuffed with “projects” and “homework” to be done during our holiday “downtime.” Because, of course, there is nothing a child wants to do more than spend a vacation working. Talk about a busman’s holiday. Seriously, can we stop with the break projects? Does my six-year-old really need to make a photo collage all about him? Must my ten-year-old sculpt clay figures of middle grass prairie life? Yes, I know that education is an ongoing process and that without my careful tending they will slowly forget everything they have learned in the past few months, but if you’re so worried about them then don’t give them to me for twenty straight days. When the nannies and teachers and therapists all disappear on me, I find myself in the dubious position of having to take care of my own kids. I have to walk away from my career and go on sabbatical, completely and without reservation, in order to satisfy all the sugarplum dreams of this pack of wolves. They have been promised so much by the media and by the world at large that I am nearly blinded by the crush of responsibility. They have to be fed, for one thing, and entertained, for another. Why add algebra?
Because of the exorbitant cost of traveling at Christmas, it has become our habit to head for the local “mountain,” armed with ski passes bought at a discount during the off-season. One year, I was too pregnant to decamp to the country for the holidays. The more babies you have, the faster they deliver, so my doctor wanted me in town in case the little one decided to pull a baby Jesus on us. We cobbled together some decorations from the 99-cent shop (my Christmastime go-to), and put up a tree in the apartment. The questions about how Santa would get in without a chimney went unanswered, Christmas passed, and for months the tree stood in the corner. Many months. We had found some energy and focus back in February to take off the decorations, but now the bare tree stood there, taking up precious urban square footage. I would like to blame the new-baby tumult, but the truth is that getting rid of a tree in New York City is not an easy feat. The Parks Department will pick them up and make them into environmentally friendly post-holiday mulch, but pickup is only on certain days, and I never seem to get the memo.
In the country, we just drag our tree outside and burn it. This sparked an idea. It occurred to me that I had never used a fire extinguisher and that perhaps it would be good to know how one works—you know, in case of an emergency. So, in the ultimate what-were-you-thinking moment, we gathered around the city tree, Peter included (so I can’t be the only adult blamed for this), and someone held a lighter to a dry, crackly branch. It wasn’t me, as I was tasked with actually putting the fire out so I was standing by with the extinguisher locked and loaded. I’m a pretty good shot with a rifle; how hard could this be? The moment the first needle caught fire, the entire six-foot tree exploded into flames. Why this result was so unexpected is a mystery to me even now, but it caused me to scream and at the same time completely forget that I was the one assigned with putting the damn thing out. I grabbed the extinguisher and aimed it at the coniferno. It stopped burning as quickly as it had started. As I looked around at the apartment, I realized the true lesson of how fire extinguishers work, and why they should be used only in case of emergency: the entire apartment was covered in a fine white powder, every crack, every crevice, every curlicue of my husband’s grandmother’s elaborately carved French provincial armoire.
“Ai-ai-ai,” Zoila said as she looked upon the scene, shaking her head and no doubt wondering at how we can create a fresh new hell for her at every turn.
Unfortunately, I don’t have a Zoila upstate to deal with the magnitude of our collective messes, so during the holidays most of the crime scene investigations are handled by yours truly. As you can imagine, it is a constant job, with armloads of toys to remove from one part of the house to the next, and countless hours spent washing clothes, dishes, and weenies. The kids do seem to have a good time, but there are a few fundamental problems for me. First and foremost, I am a warm-weather gal, and I fear the cold the way some people fear man smell, or taxes. Temperatures in the below-zeros are commonplace in the Berkshires. I don’t care if my children get frost-bite—they can still grow new toes—but me? There is only so much time a woman with my taste in shoes can spend wearing Uggly boots, and at about an hour I pass my limit. The occasional stroll out to the pond on a weekend is one thing; hanging out on a snow-covered mountain all afternoon quite another.
These ski vacations hold little interest for me because I don’t ski. I don’t understand the appeal of a sport that often results in tearing something that makes your knee stop working. Best-case scenario, I am careening down a mountain at high speed, out of control. Worst case, I am on my ass, cold and wet. And why would I willingly engage in a sport that requires me to wear puffy clothes that make me look fat? I much prefer the cute white pleated skirts suitable for summer sports, or the regal gear worn for riding. Naturally, because I can’t leave the house for fear of the cold and hideous footwear, I am stuck cooking and cleaning, two activities I also try to avoid. I do feel a responsibility to put in equal time—Peter gets the boys to the mountain every cold morning, so the least I can do is have something warm waiting for them to eat, even if that means throwing something from the bottom of the freezer in the oven.
As much as I love my husband, once the novelty of skiing with his children wears off he reverts to wandering around inside, looking for something to “fix.” I find myself wondering around day ten of Christmas break whether he has any errands that will get him out of my hair. I think he must feel the need to get away from me, also, because he starts to focus on minutiae that he otherwise tends to overlook.
“Look at the bottom of these pots,” he says a day after New Year’s. Yes, I actually tried to cook real food for New Year’s Day, and these are the thanks I get.
“Okay,” I say, not looking up from my computer, where I’m trying to sneak in a little work so I’m not swallowed up the following week.
“These are expensive pots,” he continues. “If you don’t scrub the bottoms, this gunk will get cooked on and become impossible to remove.”
“Peter, are all the children alive and accounted for?” I ask, glancing up at him.
“Well, yes,” he says, still holding the offending pot bottom up.
“I think we need milk. And see if you can’t run past Big Y and pick up some pot scrubbers while you’re
