The winds of change aren’t just brought on by an El Niño-infused Pacific Northwest winter, but they can also be brought on when the weather patterns of our feelings shift.
After Christmas, and the shit show that was, I was given a card by the boy child during a “Gift-and-Run” on New Year’s Day. If the “Gift-and-Run” is unfamiliar to you, it’s like a hit and run by a car or a doorbell ditch, it’s like that. So, the boy child did a “Gift-and-Run” of a card. He basically tossed the card to me as he was walking upstairs. I wasn’t sure what to do, so I left it on the table next to me for about an hour while I thought about what I should do. Do I call him down to open it, or do I open it without him? I couldn’t believe I was strategizing over the opening of an envelope. It’s not like I was presenting at the Academy Awards and opening the Price Waterhouse Cooper envelope. …And the winner is…an overthinking adult.
After way too much thought, I opened it without him.
Here’s what I found inside the envelope:
I’m not kidding, this was the card with a $25 Amazon card inside. BOTH kids signed it! I called upstairs and thanked him. Then I thought about it more. I obsessed. After receiving nothing (or a candy bar) for Christmas’ past, I was shocked. I asked the Captain, “What did you tell them to get them to do this.” He said, “nothing,” and that when he was going to talk to him a few weeks ago, the boy child brought it up to him that he wanted to get me something. Wha?
I thanked the boy child and nonchalantly asked the boy child if this was for me and his dad? He said, “nope.”
The kids gave me something for Christmas?
The writing was definitely the girl child’s. Then, being me, the Unofficial Stepmom, I looked at the date on the gift receipt, I’m sure he picked it up on the way over on New Year’s Day, because Christmas was so awful.
Holy shit, the date on the gift receipt was from Christmas Eve.
I can’t believe it. The kids cared enough to send the very best.
The Unofficial Stepmom 