It doesn’t help my seasonal confusion that stores are bedecked in every Halloween decoration known to man. But fine: Halloween is next month, so I suppose putting out the witches and pumpkins and—thank God—bags of mini Snickers is not entirely unreasonable.

However, I take issue with Christmas in September, and that is precisely what is going on at Hallmark stores. Ornaments everywhere, tossed here and asunder with nary a thought of these last two weeks of summer. The most disturbing thing is that many of the ornaments in question are a bit…off. What do I mean? Well, we’re going to need photographic aids for this. Let’s see. Ah, yes. Here we go.

First of all, many of the ornaments don’t seem as innocent as in days of old. Take Ariel, who is without doubt as high as a kite. Mermaid or human, say what you will, but no one’s pupils become that dilated without a little help. Someone’s been partaking of the Forbidden Seaweed, methinks.

Of course, it doesn’t help that the Hallmark store is rife with enablers.

I ask you: Since when do Barbie’s Friday Night Dates consist of trays heaped with beer mugs? Stick a straw in them all you want: I know a hefeweizen when I see one. (For the record, I blame Barbie’s descent into iniquity on the Bratz dolls. Anyone with half a brain cell knew the kind of influence THEY’D be.)

On the other hand, a life of narcotics does seem to agree with some ornaments.

I daresay this is the best I’ve ever seen Eli Manning look. Then again, it’s not Eli’s fault that I usually take one look at him, immediately associate him with his older brother, and hate him with a passion typically reserved for people who use the word playdate.

Others have not fared so well, though.

I mean, I saw the preview for Prince of Persia. I may have even hit the Back button and watched it 32 more times. And Jake Gyllenhaal didn’t look like this. Which just proves drugs are bad, kids. One day you have abs defined enough to cut steak, the next you look like a tragically slimmed-down version of The Rock.

That being said, Jake looks pretty damn good in comparison to, well, this:

While this may actually be Kristin Stewart’s best hair day yet, Robert Pattinson is just…well. Words cannot describe. Except for maybe HORRIBLE and TERRIFYING and FOREHEAD SEEMS TO BE LACED WITH ODD STITCHES.

Still, most of what I’ve described is merely cosmetic. Yet drug dependence is so much more serious than that. It’s not just reduced muscle tone and enlarged pupils. Oh, no. It’s much, MUCH more than that:

Sigh. Oh, Hallmark. It’s all fun and games, until someone loses a head.

As we were waiting for the printer to spew out our hotel confirmation, Aura looked up at my desk and spotted the miniature American flag she had received at last year’s local Fourth of July parade. She nabbed it, then began waving it, marching, and singing a song she must have learned in preschool:

Oh, we love our flag, our country

The red, the white, the blue.

Oh, we love our flag, our country

The red, the white, the blue.

Oh, we love our flag, our country

The red, the white, the blue.

Wave it high and free!

I applauded when she finished. “What a great song to sing as we start the Memorial Day holiday weekend!” I said.

“What do you mean, Mommy?” Aura asked, the little flag fluttering in the breeze from the air conditioning. “What is Memorial Day?”

And so I tried to explain, without explaining too much. How lucky we are to live in a country where we are free to do so many things. How sometimes the very bravest people who live here have to fight other people in other places who don’t want us to be so free, or don’t want other people in other places to be free. How sometimes those brave people fight so hard that they can’t come home again. I stuttered and backtracked and edited and probably muddied the explanation completely.

“But why do some people not want us to be free?” Aura asked, watching me fold clothes into rectangles and tuck them neatly into our suitcase.

I paused, stroking errant wisps of hair back from her forehead. “I don’t know, sweetie,” I answered, although “I don’t know” didn’t seem like much of an answer at all. “But on Memorial Day we stop to really remember all the people who help keep our lives as wonderful as they are.”

Then we packed some more and talked about hotels and lit-up billboards, about pastrami sandwiches and bagels, about Central Park and carousels. And I kept thinking, Wave it high and free, baby. High and free.

***************

(Thank you to all those in the military who have served, are serving, and will serve. Always, thank you.)

It's kind of the manufacturers to explain that I am the one who needs to pony up the $5.99. I tried angling it at the cashier, thinking she could be the YOU, but no luck.

When Aura woke up yesterday morning and heard of my purchase, she became intrigued.  Since then, there has been much examination of the box, some frantic shaking of it, and several related queries.  For one, how do these crackers crack? When they crack, is it loud, kind of loud, or so loud she might cry? What kind of toy is inside? A good toy or only a kind-of-good toy? Can she crack only one cracker, or can she maybe have two?  

“You’ll just have to wait and see!” I crowed each time, having no idea myself what to expect from these Deluxe Crackers. She’s napping now, probably dreaming of their contents: luxuriant thumb-sized stuffed animals, silky confetti, a few tiny Deluxe Cracker-sized lollipops trimmed with diamonds. Me, I’m getting a little nervous. Having now actually read the back of the box, I fear that this New Year’s Eve will bring nothing but crushing disappointment.  Here, let me show you what I mean: 

Nugget of advice: Never trust something called a "novelty."

I’m not sure how I feel about getting a motto in my cracker. Sure, a nice little “Live each day to its fullest!” is harmless enough. But what if I crack my Deluxe Cracker and find myself faced with “It’s never pleasant to have the widest thighs in the room!” or “Self-induced stress leads to the highest blood pressure known to man!” The crackers were made in China. If workers over there use lead paint in children’s toys, you KNOW they won’t resist the chance to insult adults imbecilic enough to buy Deluxe Crackers. 

See artful red circling.

Wait. It is me? A “surprise” bang?  Is this description actually a stealthy disclaimer for the criminally stupid? Did someone, somewhere buy a box of Deluxe Crackers back in 2008, pull one open, then promptly fall over dead from the shock of the eponymous crack? Perhaps I am just missing the point here. Maybe this is no ordinary crack. Maybe this is a earth-shaking, ear-splitting BANG so loud that the downstairs bathroom’s light fixture, the one I loathe with every loathing molecule of my being, will shatter and need to be immediately replaced. 

Apparently it is imperative that you take your crackers outside to the backyard, where you can then festively pull them open in front of your trusty boxwood shrub.

Huh. Is it possible that I have been giving the Deluxe Crackers too little credit? After all, when we open each one tonight, we won’t just be getting a prize. Oh no. We will be getting a Prize.  And that’s just different. 

Aura’s awake! Off to crack.  Will report back, if not struck deaf.

We’re doing better here, adjusting and healing  and refraining from killing each other a solid 90% of the time.  In particular, Aura has been a real trooper, exhibiting surprisingly massive amounts of patience while I help my mother get around. We had to change up the  holiday plans a bit, but we’re trying to squeeze in stuff too important and photo-friendly for her to miss, such as cookie baking and the annual peppermint-stick-ice-cream run. Basically, anything that will propel her along the rocky yet delicious road to childhood obesity. 

Apparently, making peppermint bark was one tradition we could have skipped. It seems to inspire surliness.

Oh, and Zoo Lights, our local zoo’s holiday extravaganza. Actually, much like the sad little budget-strapped zoo itself, the event is perpetually shabby and downtrodden. Yet it is this consistency that makes it so much of a tradition.  When you know ahead of time that at least half of the light displays will be burnt out and the giant inflatable snow globes will be malfunctioning, you can hand over your $5 cheerily, your expectations so low that they can never be squashed.  Also, Zoo Lights is an excellent time to wear fake fur.  TOTALLY freaks out the downy reindeer babies with whom you can pose for another five bucks. 

All that being said, it might have been wise for Mommy to check the temperature outside before we headed for the zoo. Turns out maybe our expectations could have been a little lower, if only they hadn’t been completely and utterly frozen like the rest of our bodies. Seriously, nothing mars a Zoo Lights experience like 10 degrees. And it was as if only irrational anger could warm me enough to survive. As we raced by the empty outdoor animal exhibits, I became furious that the ANIMALS were not there but instead undoubtedly warm in their little ANIMAL BEDS AND CAVES AND NESTS and whatnot. Whenever we were able to duck into a building where animals were cozily ensconced behind glass, it was all I could do not to kick the windows. And they KNEW it.  The lemurs practically snickered when we stopped to look at them, their sneers eerily reflected by the half-lit snowman behind us. Also, Adam swears he heard a river otter chuckle.  Truth be told, I wouldn’t put it past them. They’re smarmy little suckers, those otters. 

The saving grace, in Aura’s opinion, was the rides. 

I’m a little fuzzy on why there are rides at Zoo Lights, but there they are. Four, to be exact: A merry-go-round made up of strange bedfellows (witness demonic bunny above), a rickety train, mini-motorcycles, and a preschooler-size Tilt-a-Whirl. After taking a spin on the Bunny from Hell, Aura decided it was time for the Tilt-a-Whirl. Since even squinting at any ride that rotates makes Adam nauseous, I was nominated to be Aura’s ridemate. 

Let me tell you: There is NOTHING more fun than whirling around and around and then around again in ten-degree weather in the world’s smallest ride car, except perhaps having your fingernails removed, or waterboarding. Yet I laughed, because Aura was laughing, her princess-gloved hands spinning the wheel at warp speed. And a short time later, when I threw up discreetly behind an unfortunate three-legged Rudolph, I still thought it was all worth it.

Now that I’m a mother, I have a brand-new appreciation for this time of year. Yes, watching Aura painstakingly unwrap every present in her stocking is camera-worthy. Of course listening to her make up her own never-ending lyrics to the tune of “Jingle Bells” is worth the price of admission. But what I’m really talking about are THE OPTIONS. Man. You can spend every single day of the Christmas season doing a new activity and never once hit up the Rainforest Café or the H1N1-ridden children’s room in the library or the toy section of the Dollar Tree. There are tree-lighting ceremonies, holiday-themed storytimes, crappy craft fair upon crappy craft fair–it’s like a never-ending parade of pine-scented events. And that, folks, is the true meaning of Christmas: ways to burn time.

Exhibit #1: Hanging garland on mailbox. If one is armed with the proper plastic tool, this activity can take at least 10 minutes. Maybe 12.

This may not seem like much to parents who work outside the home (although I know you all definitely have a deep appreciation of the subject on weekends), but to stay-at-home parents, discovering new reasons for getting out of the house and away from the morning’s ninth game of Chutes and Ladders is like crack. Really good crack, I imagine. Like if this was TV, you’d be buying it from the astonishingly good-looking drug dealer in the VIP section of the club, not the skeezy guy on the corner near the car wash. That’s how good.

Anyway. Moving on.

I discovered all this last year, when Aura and I began what I like to think back on as the Month of What It is Surely Like in Hell, or At Least the Really Undesirable Section of Purgatory. Shortly after Thanksgiving 2008, Aura and I came down with raging colds and prolonged cases of pink eye. Just for fun I also developed an inner-ear infection, whose single redeeming factor was that I could totally gross out strangers with its existence.  Before that, I had no idea how easy it is to freak out a grocery-store cashier. You mention “rupture” and “eardrum” in the same sentence and it’s like every single person in a Stop & Shop apron goes pasty. This is very satisfying when they’ve forgotten to scan your frequent-shopper card again. Makes you forget all about the knives stabbing you in the ear.

We interrupt for Exhibit #2: Shopping for and buying holiday socks. Easily takes up another 20 minutes, maybe 25 if you suggest putting on the good patent-leather shoes, too.

Between the two of us, Aura and I were pretty much blind and deaf for two-thirds of December. Yet we adjusted. Though it frustrated her, Aura got used to yelling into my good ear. I slowly became accustomed to wearing glasses instead of contacts, albeit glasses with a prescription four years out of date. Most days we weren’t fit for hobnobbing with others, so every fever-free evening I would plunk Aura in her car seat and we would drive around for an hour, trying to spot new Christmas light displays. It was a merry time, Aura announcing inflatable snowmen at top volume in the direction of my right ear, me weaving on the road, squinting wildly so as not to hit any carolers.

On days when we were feeling particularly frisky and non-contagious, Aura and I would truck on over to Target, where we would ooh and aah over the displays of moving wicker reindeer and point out the artificial Christmas trees we would have bought if Daddy hadn’t been so cheap and insisted on the shortish one with wonky boughs. Then we’d head to a nearby ice-cream shop and take out heaping cups of peppermint-stick ice cream.

It was during these quiet, nearly blind times that I began to fully appreciate the depth and breadth of the Christmas season.  So much to do! So much to experience together! If only we weren’t walking, breathing clouds of plague!

And so, in the throes of a rare spell of non-preschool-tainted good health, I enter Christmas Season 2009 with high hopes. Perhaps a little too high, since I believe Aura and I are scheduled to witness 12 tree lightings and pay visits to approximately 36 mall Santas. Such carousing will no doubt tax our immune systems to the brink. But, hey, we have all of January to lie in bed.

Exhibit #3: Riding the Holiday Express, aka decked-out commuter rail train. Meeting Elmo and then talking about it gets you 60 minutes minimum.