Like Pinches of Empathic Cinnamon

She touched Angel Cakes and cried out. She had tried not to touch her by pulling her sleeve down over her hand, but her hand slipped out as she grabbed the elf named Angel Cakes from a shelf to move her to a chair.

"Oh no!"

Beatrice froze after she said it.

"What's wrong?" asked Bryce.

"I touched Angel Cakes!"

"Are you sure you did?"

"Yes, I'm sure. Dad, I need cinnamon!"

"Why?" I said.

Now, at this point I was in the middle of something semi-important on my computer and not really paying attention.

"Because I touched Angel Cakes. She'll lose her magical powers if I don't sprinkle cinnamon around her!"

Again Bryce tried to make her feel better. "Are you sure you touched her? Maybe you didn't."

"I did, Bryce! I did!"

"Beatrice, look up where the other spices are for the cinnamon," I said.

She looked. "Dad, I don't see it. We have to hurry!"

"Bea, the elf will be okay, just keep looking."

Of course, Mom had to be the one to come downstairs and find the cinnamon, which was actually in a place neither of us would've looked, which I realized afterwards was where we always kept it and I should've known. But again, I was doing something semi-important on my computer (making a new Christmas music playlist actually -- hey, that's important).

We had just gotten back from Thanksgiving at my sister's house and the shelf elves had appeared again in our house, coming out of elven hibernation at the North Pole since last Christmas. According to shelf-elf lore, or our daughters' version of the lore, you can't touch the red shelf elves with your hands or they'll lose their magical power. The others you can touch with bare hands, just not the red ones. Which is why you have to sprinkle cinnamon around the red elves, so they can get their magical powers back. The cinnamon is like a super-vitamin. After a little research, though, I didn't tell the girls that they must also write an apology letter to Santa Claus if they touch one of the elves. It's stressful and creepy enough that the elves move around every night with all our shelf-elfing shenanigans. No need to stress out the girls about being in hot water with Santa.

Even after that semi-traumatic shelf elf event, what I'm the most happy about are two things. The first is the fact that my family loves the holidays and we're all in with decorating and the festive and loving sentiments of the seasons. Even Bryce who fights it a little here and there when she'd rather be playing Minecraft, Roblox or watching silly YouTube videos. And I even broke our decorating tradition this year by hanging lights outside before Thanksgiving. Mercy me. That nearly caused a rift in the space-time continuum, but then we sealed the deal, or unsealed the universe, by listening to Christmas music before Thanksgiving in addition to decorating early. Also, Beatrice just calls out to Alexa, "Alexa, play classic Christmas music!" Right on, Bea. In my defense, however, we're having a string of winter storms now, which we need, and I wouldn't have been able to decorate outside right after Thanksgiving like we usually do. They both also helped pick out gifts for a family experiencing domestic violence that we're again adopting this year.

The second thing I'm most happy about is the fact that our girls long to be with extended family and friends, to share continuous friendship, love and gratitude without selfish agenda or emotional baggage. Well, sometimes there's a selfish agenda when gift-getting is involved, but hey, they are still kids. However, they don't have the purposeful and painful distancing that comes with time and experience, when relationships can and do go awry and forgiveness is conditional. And although we are those adults with those experiences, we continue to foster positive growth and compassion for all, to be aware of our own feelings and their fluid context, as well as those of others, and encourage our girls to do the same. Our daughters remind us to look at extended family and friends and see wonderful human beings, people doing their personal best or trying to (including us), even if we don't always see eye to eye (and we sure as hell don't always see eye to eye), and every day our hearts and souls are a little fuller with them in our lives.

Even if it's only in little dashes year after year, like pinches of empathic cinnamon to keep our magical powers intact.