Akex figured out the whole Santa thing when he was three years old. Rather than relate the whole tale, I would direct you to something Thump wrote several years ago (and thanks for digging up the link for me, Thumps.) He was very good about never spoiling the whole thing for Rachel, and later Kevin, but on a parental plane, not having that with him was something we later realized we missed.

Now Kevin has admitted that he's figured it out, too, but he won't spoil it for Toni and Travis--and he now understands why Alex saves money fanatically all through the year, only to spend it all in one giant shopping trip after which he comes home empty handed.

He wants to go with Alex this year; he's got exactly $16.45 in his piggy bank, but he wants to spend it all on a toy and then donate the it (Dad will sneak him a little extra cash, but he won't know that until we get to the store.) Alex's only reservation in Kevin tagging alog was whether or not it would bother me: this is something he and I have done together for the last 11 years and he wasn't sure if I would resent it if he brought Kevin into it.

Hardly. I hate shopping but I am looking forward to this. Once established that I didn't mind this shopping trip not being just Alex and I they invited Rachel, too, but she declined, understanding, I think, that I might want to have something with just my boys.

She would be correct; still, I would also like to find something that's just for her and me (that doesn't involve shirtless werewolves and sparkling vampires) but she's a hard read sometimes. She's sweet and genuine, but she's also close to turning 13 and is smack in the middle of everything that brings with it.

I'll figure it out.

I guess the point really is that my kids get it, and they got it without much input from me. I'm not sure how I could be any prouder of them for how generous they inherently are.

Witout intention, we seem to have kicked off the holiday season with giant doses of sexism. On Thursday the men were banned from the kitchen (except for Travis, who welded his weapon of cuteness to be allowed in) while the women cooked dinner, and yesterday Char, her sister, and Rachel were up at 3 am to hit the Black Friday sales. This has never interested Char before, but Nika wanted to, and Rachel was inexplicably excited about it.

While they shopped, the rest of us stayed at home and ignored the To-Do list that was left on the kitchen counter. Instead, Alex and Kevin took the dogs to the park while Brad helped me winterize my bike (his help consisted of him standing there with a beer in hand, pointing out to Peter everything I was doing wrong and ho he'd be doing it if he was doing it--but he wouldn't be doing it because he rides even when it's cold.) By the time Char got home, Brad had the grill fired up and was grilling ribs, which kept her from grousing about having her list ignored.

They were gone until almost 4 o'clock yet didn't get much actual Christmas shopping done. I'm not sure I want to ask what they were actually doing, because I'm afraid I would get a lengthy explanation of each of their shopping techniques.

I'd hoped they'd get it all done to spare me from being dragged out later, but no such luck.

This coming week is going to be busy as hell, started off by Kevin and Rachel having another ortho appointment. We haven't told them yet, but we're going to let them hold off until after the holidays to get their braces put on. Kevin doesn't seem to care all that much, but Rachel has been stressed about the idea, and if Alex is right, half the reason is because she doesn't want to have brand new braces and the accompanying headaches right now because of all the holiday choir concerts, and the other half is because of the junior high Christmas dance. She doesn't have a "date" to it, but some squeaky thirteen year old has apparently already asked her for the first dance.

I think I should offer to chaperone that dance.

Last year, we mostly ignored Thanksgiving. My dad had recently died, and no one felt like celebrating without him; it was one of his favorite days of the year, and for days leading up to it the house echoed with his absence. There was no doubt that we had much to be thankful for, but it almost felt like a betrayal to him to do anything more than watch the football game on TV.

This year felt very different. He never stepped foot (or rolled his chair) into this house, but we could all feel him here. The things we feel thankful for feel multiplied; the kids are are healthy and far happier here than they were living out in the sticks, we see more of Char's father and my niece and her husband, and Char's sister plopped out of nowhere and is a constant in our lives. This close family is even closer; our kids don't just tolerate each other, they like each other. They protect each other. They laugh at jokes no one else could possibly understand; they respect each other. They treat us with respect, even when they're making fun of us.

If that was all I had today, it would be enough.

But July first changed everything. I had come a little too close to losing Char once before, and Rachel with her, but July first was monumentally, uncomfortably close. So close that by all logic that Brad and the kids and I should have spent today drenched in our grief. Today should have been agony.

Instead, today was filled with lightness and life. I woke up today not dreading the day but excited about it; my house was going to be filled with the sound of kids laughing. My father in law would be here giving my kids crap about Santa. My niece and her husband would be here with my grandkids. My sister in law would be here with her fiance, helping Char cook while threatening Brad and me with sharp objects if we took one step towards her pies.

As cheesy as it sounds, I woke up feeling my father's approval. He would have been overjoyed today, and would have helped Brad whip the kids into a holiday frenzy. I still miss my father so much that it does often hurt, but today I could feel what he would have wanted me to.

Mostly, though, today I woke up next to the woman who should not be here, and I watched her sleep until the sound of Kevin slamming the pantry door shut woke her up. I watched her stretch, and then smile just before she curled up against me. I started today holding one of the most precious things my life will ever have.

I have so many things to be thankful for, but today I am most grateful for that. I am beyond my ability to give thanks for just the simple act of being able to watch her breathe. I could not be more thankful that I have the chance to spend many, many more years with her, to grow old with her, and to spoil a dozen grandkids with her.

Happy Thanksgiving.

Char heard the phone ring, but we've learned to not make much of an effort to answer it; if we do, we nearly get knocked over by either the teenager or the almost-teenager in their zeal to get to it first, just in case it's someone who didn't bother to call them on the cells. Even though it never is.

No one came to get her, so she assumed that for once it was for one of them, and went back to the book she was reading.

Twenty minutes later, now curious about the level of quiet that didn't feel right, she went into the kitchen and Kevin was sitting at the table doing homework; the phone was off the hook and lying on the kitchen counter. Puzzeled, she asked him why it was not hung up.

Uncle Craig is on the phone.

Why didn't you come get me?

He wanted to talk to Dad. I said I would tell him he was on the phone.

Your dad isn't home, Kevin.

I didn't say when I would tell him...

I'm not sure what's funnier: that Kevin left Craig hanging like that, or that my idiot brother was still on the other end, waiting.

I owe Alex.

In a moment of massive not-paying-attention-to-the-actual-request, I promised Rachel I would take her and several friends to see New Moon after school today. They're 12; I don't just drop kids off at a theater, I suffer through whatever it is they want to see, but when I realized what I had agreed to, I was tempted. Very tempted.

Rachel squealed to Alex that she and her friends were going and he must have seen the look on my face, and told her that Stephanie wanted to see it it, so would she mind if they tagged along? Rachel was all for it; anything is better than squirmy Dad in a theater.

Before they all poured out of the car Alex set the ground rules: he and Stephanie would sit behind them, no talking after the previews were over, no squealing when the shirtless boys showed up on the screen, no going to the bathroom alone, and no talking back if he asked them to pipe down.

Good job.

He has a date tomorrow; they're going out for pizza and are meeting friends there. I think to show my appreciation, I'll pop for the first pizza. I'd pay for the whole thing, but I've seen Alex and his friends eat, and I could go broke.

(This is where I have to admit that moving has turned out to be a good thing all the way around; I actually get to go home until he calls for a ride, rather than finding a place in town to hang out.)

On the Kevin Front: he's not taking ballet anymore. Instead he's taking stage & production dancing, as his teacher thought he would enjoy it more, and it will incorporate some ballet. The kid really likes to dance and she sees a little performer emerging and wants to help him find what he'll both excel at and love. So far, I think she's on the mark. He's sticking with TKD, too, and will probably test for his black belt around his 11th birthday. Yes, I caved on the age issue. TK wants the minumum to be 10, and since this is now TK's school, 10 it is.

We've got the dojang moved and classes have resumed, the kids all have things going on now that require parental taxi service, for some reason I am expected to be sociable, we've been to a wedding, visited two students in the hospital, had meetings with several parents of TKD students in need of a little extra help, one dog that ate an entire box of bran cereal, major cleanup of carpets because of one dog that ate an entire box of bran cereal, and an argument over who left the damned box of cereal where Tank could get to it, and why the hell do we need bran cereal anyway? I need a clone. One who can clean up runny dog shit without gagging.

You don't choose your family. They are God's gift to you, as you are to them.

~Bishop Desmond Tutu

In the wake of my kids discovering that I'd been married before and feeling the need to apologize for publically calling my ex bat shit crazy, Char has been emailing back and forth with her.

This isn't a complete surprise; before my parents moved out here she and Kathy spent some time together on visits back home, and they got along. I never would have expected it, but they liked each other. So now they're swapping email and stories about what our kids are up to and the things her now-grown step-kids have been doing. I get it third hand, because, to be honest, it all feels a little weird and I'm not keen on trying to forge a friendship with my ex-wife.

I hope she doesn't take that personally. It's not meant to be; as stung as Alex was by the revelation for my first marriage, he would be hurt if he ever found out I was talking to her, and that's a pain I don't wish to inflict on him. And while I like my ex...I am just not compelled to sit down and fire off an email to her.

No, I don't mind that Char has formed a somewhat unique pen-pal type friendship with her. I have gotten some insight into things that left me baffled when we split up; she didn't want kids, yet turned around a married a guy who had six kids of his own, and custody of all of them.

By then I had long moved on and Char not only had wrapped me around her little finger, but we had already gotten married and had Alex; it was still a little off putting to realize that it wasn't that Kathy hadn't wanted kids; she didn't want them with me.

There was amusement wrapped up in the WTF feeling; she had little experience with small kids and was suddenly surrounded by them.

Over the last couple of months, Char and Kathy have talked about this; whatever Kathy told her, Char understood in an estrogen-soaked way, comprehending Kathy's thoughts in a shorthand that I've come to think only women understand.

That's not a slap against women; it's an admission that men in general don't always get the way women communicate, especially with each other.

Basically, I didn't get it.

Then this morning Char handed the latest Reader's Digest to me with it held open to the above-mentioned quote by Desomnd Tutu. This is what she means; it's what you already knew. You two were together to hold a place for the families you were destined to get, not the family everyone expected you to create.

I can accept that. I'm not sure I believe it 100%. Our familes may be God's gift, but to use someone else as a placeholder, especially when hearts are on the line and there is so much inherent expectation, feels a little bit cruel.

But what do I know?

If we were using each other it never felt intentional. And in the end, we're both much happier people now, with our priorities lined up in an exponentially more mature line. We're where we want to be. It was worth the pain to get here.

I can't imagine wanting to be anywhere else.