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2008 Beers Family Christmas Newsletter

Hello, friends and family. Thank you all for joining us yet again for a recap of the adventures of the Beers family throughout 2008 (excepting the six weeks following the writing of this piece, but if anything important happens I’ll fill you in next year, or you can just check Betsy’s blog (www.onemillionreasons.blogspot.com) which is where I go to find out anything that Betsy might be keeping from me, like car accidents and pregnancies).
I will begin with Macy, the youngest member of the family, who has decided that, as long as people are willing to bring her things, there is absolutely no need to walk. Ever. Macy has developed a knack for repeating much of what she hears and her father has put this trait to good use by teaching her the names of various Star Wars characters. Betsy knows nothing of this. Macy’s best friends are her bear, Pink Joey, and the Tupperware cabinet.
Jackson, who will turn five in March (Jackson Five, cool, huh?), has started preschool and is doing very well. His teachers say that Jackson is very helpful and quite a good listener, which leads Jackson’s father to believe that his son’s teachers are filthy liars. Jackson, being four, is very energetic and opinionated and LOUD. He’s also very cute when he sleeps.
Betsy is continuing with her plan to take over the world. Matt found a receipt in the trash for a death ray, so it looks like things are going well for Mrs. Beers.
The king of the castle, or rather, the acting mascot of the house, Matt, recently decided to let his glorious hair once again cascade down his bronzed shoulders only to realize, rather painfully, that there will be no more cascading hair, nor any bronzed shoulders for that matter, unless he pays for a wax job, and that doesn’t look like happening any time soon.

The following is a list of actual things that happened to the Beers familia in 2008:

Jack played his first, and probably last, season of soccer. There was a tense moment when we thought he was going to kick the ball, but instead he screamed at it and ran away.
Macy found that the most comfortable place one can place one’s finger is in one’s nose. Or in the nose of a loved one.
Betsy turned thirty, which justifies Matt’s wearing so much black.
For a couple of months in the summer Matt began a regular exercise program and reaffirmed that running is stupid. He lost approximately zero (0) pounds and is now the proud owner of bad knees.
Jack has started reading and he also understands simple math concepts like addition and fraud.
Macy has stopped crying when she is dropped off at the church nursery, however, she cries whenever she sees her grandmother, which is kind of funny.
Matt and Betsy became members of Pathway Community Church. If you happen to run into them there, please refer to them as Santos and Maria Ramirez. There was a problem with the background check.
Conan has made it very clear that he does not miss the cat in the least.
Jack has decided that he will be either a race car driver or a “fire truck worker” when he grows up, despite his father’s hopes that he will become a ninja or a pirate.
Macy has only two teeth, which she uses with surgical precision to carve cheese sculptures.
Betsy has continued scrapbooking, making the leap to digi-scrapping, which is a thing I’m pretty sure she made up just so she could buy a laptop.
Matt has pretty much stopped writing altogether since he got a Nintendo Wii for Christmas last year. For a few weeks in February he also stopped bathing, but Betsy made it very clear that… Well, he now bathes habitually.

Matt and Betsy would like to thank each and every one of you for whatever it is you do for them throughout the year. If you feel such thanks are unwarranted, they have a list of things that you could do for them. Just let them know.
Have a merry Christmas and a safe New Year and we hope that 2009 is as wonderful as you deserve.
With much love,
Matt, Betsy, Jack, and Macy Beers

p.s. You didn’t think I forgot the haiku, did you? Well, I kinda did, but then I remembered so shut up.

This year I’m going
to do my very best to
out drink my grandma.

I'm so white, I can't spell

I don't know how to spell quesadillas... quesedillas... case-o-dilloes... Mexican chicken sandwich with cheese and sour cream. That's why, in the last two posts, I spelled it two different ways, just so I would be right at least once. Just wanted to clear that up.

Puerto Rican correction

It was pointed out to me that quesedillas are not typically a Puerto Rican dish. Not that it mattered much as the power went out shortly after Brian and April got to our house and we had to abandon the quesedillas for Wendy's hamburgers.

If you're confused, I apologize. I am referring to my previous post. If you haven't read it, do so now.

Actually, that's really all I have to say on the subject. In fact, I would probably be better off just deleting this post, but then I'd have to write something else and it would probably be something about Christmas with my dad or how family is good but out-of-state family is better. So, in an effort to keep things pleasant, I will just post this crippled thing and let those who wish to make sense of it do so at their leisure.

a Peurto Rican is coming for dinner

I'm pretty excited because my old friend Brian (who is Puerto Rican, hence the title of this entry) is coming for dinner (hence the rest of the title to this entry) with his wife April (who didn't earn a mention in the title of this entry). Betsy is making quesadillas which I think is a pretty ballsy move on her part. She's putting her quesadillas to the ultimate test. I wish I could have her confidence.

the holidays

I love Christmas. It's the one time of year we all feel good about getting together with people we would otherwise avoid. Happy, happy.

the skipped generation

Maybe I'm the only one who feels this way, but I look around at the guys I call my friends (what they call me is a different story) and I see a group of men who have never been given any direction. None of us really seem sure of ourselves, or else we strut around with a chip on our shoulder trying to prove that we don't need anyone to tell us who we are, thank you very much.

It seems that if there isn't a serious conflict overseas to distract us, we turn our suspicious gaze on our children. That was why everyone was so concerned with "Generation X." The Gulf Conflict was over and everyone got bored. No one knows what to do if they don't have an enemy. So we tackled the problem of those depressing youngsters and their destructive grunge music.

Those scary boys and girls in their flannel shirts and crazy hair are now lawyers and doctors and teachers and whatnot. Some of them became alcoholics and prostitutes, just like the media said they would, but there have always been alcoholics and prostitutes. Those Gen-Xers were just filling a niche.

And so, while all eyes were on our older siblings, those of us too young for the X label got ignored. Then America went to war and we got ignored again. The only way to get anyone to notice you, it seems, is to go overseas and get shot or blown up.

Here we are, waiting for someone to tell us what to do next. Here we are, loaded to the gills with diplomas and degrees and licenses that we aren't using and that we never needed anyway, and we just want someone to tell us what to do. But when you're thirty no one tells you what to do. They all expect you to know, though. We're expected to know how to be good employees, good moms and dads. No one ever set those examples for us. We don't know where we're going, let alone how to get there.

Maybe it's just me, but that's what I see everywhere I look.

the girl who made my chocolate chai was giving me the eye

When a person says they were given "the eye" what exactly does that mean? Let's explore.

There are many eyes one can be given. The evil eye. Bedroom eyes. Pink eye. It goes on and on, depending on the cultural customs of your region.

The evil eye, as it's name implies, is a bad, bad thing to get from someone. Bedroom eyes can also be a bad, bad thing. It all hinges on the giver of the eye and the status of the receiver. I, for one, am fond of receiving bedroom eyes, provided my wife is the giver. The chocolate chai girl, however, had no business trying to get into my business. She looked kinda like this guy I know and if he made bedroom eyes at me I don't think I could handle it. He's a pretty big guy and if he were so inclined I don't know if "No" would, in fact, mean "No."

I'm done. I just kinda wanted to brag that the girl in the coffee shop wanted my venti biscotti. To be honest, I'm really more of an espresso.

the snow ramp

I must keep this brief as I am hoping to beat the massive snowfall that is apparently collecting above us at this very moment. My hope is this: to build a ten-foot long ramp in my backyard, cover it with snow and, if there is time, maybe run some water over it so it will freeze, then send my kid down it on a sled like a teeny, tiny crash-test dummy. I'm off to Lowe's!

my buddy, Special K

I have this friend named Brad. He's a few years younger than I am and I met him for the first time when I was in the seventh grade and he was still in elementary school. There was a small group of us, Joe, Nate, two Brads, and I. There were a few other people who came and went periodically, but mostly it was us five.

I came in comparatively late in the game. The other four were already established friends, mostly due to the fact that they were two sets of brothers whose houses backed up to one another. But it was pretty great, the way they took me in, no questions asked.

Anyway, Brad was the youngest of the group and he almost never spoke. No, that's not true. He never spoke, period. And he was one crafty mother effer. We'd play hide-and-seek in the neighborhood after dark and that kid could stand next to you in a shadow for an hour and you'd never know it. He was so amazingly patient that it was almost no fun playing against him. If he was on your team it was awesome, but only if he was on your team.

One morning, a few years later (we attended the same school at this time), I was in a really bad mood. No one would get near me because I was being a total douche-bag, but it didn't seem to faze Brad. Without any kind of emotion at all he said to me, "You know what you need? Sideburns." I don't know why, but it made me laugh. We started calling him "Sideburns" after that.

There was something joyful lurking beneath Brad's frail, serial killer exterior. As the years went on Brad said more and more and each time he opened his mouth something profound and hilarious came out. He is probably the funniest person I have ever met.

Brad is one of my favorite people in the world (he and my friend Bob will always be partnered in my memory), and soon he will be moving away. I am very, very sad.

I shouldn't be sad. Brad and I haven't spent any time together for a long time. He has his life and I have mine. Everything between us is a long time in the past, but I will always cherish it.

Brad is moving to Florida to be closer to his girlfriend, which is great. But I'm still sad. It won't feel right around here without Brad. I will miss him a lot.

worm's-eye view

This is what my penis sees.

snow

MAN! I love snow. I love most everything from Thanksgiving until about the second week in January. I'll explain why.

Thanksgiving marks the beginning of that time of year when everyone sort of turns into a Christian. Everyone is so nice and generous and forgiving (I know, I know... not ALL Christians are like that, just the good ones). You look forward to getting together with your family, no matter how little you like them. You put aside petty differences, you look past age-old offenses (like when my older brother hand-cuffed me to a telephone pole and left for an hour, during which it started to rain, and then came back drunk). You think more about giving than receiving. It's just a very, very warm month, from Thanksgiving to Christmas.

Then comes the New Year. What's not to love? That imagined fresh start. The built-in excuse to keep gorging yourself on holiday cookies (because you'll go on a diet after the New Year). And then everyone makes ridiculously outlandish proclamations of planned morality and we watch a bunch of exploding projectiles fly through the sky, ignoring the fact that we're at war with a nation who has been doing this exact thing since time out of mind. Also, we're all drunk.

Then, just as we're getting over the hoo-ha, my birthday. Whatever I didn't get for Christmas, I get for my birthday. And people either get really excited for me because they just aren't done celebrating the holidays yet and they need an excuse to get all bouncy and weird, or they ignore it completely because they were done celebrating on December the sixth.

I love the wardrobe change from summer to winter. I'm a chubby sort of fellow and I don't fancy showing off my goods everyday, in other words, shorts are not my friend. I like wrapping up in ratty old sweaters and warm pants and I like wearing scarves around the house and I like feeling like a bear, assuming that a bear has a self-defeating personality disorder and a crippling fear of failure.

I don't even mind shoveling the driveway. In fact, I kind of enjoy it. I would much rather do it by hand with a shovel than with a snow-blower. It's just that peaceful rhythm. The method, the progress, the whole problem and solution thing. A snow-blower just cheapens the whole thing. It's loud and clumsy and it fills the air with noxious fumes. To me, clearing the driveway with a shovel rather than with a snow-blower is like making a birthday card instead of going out and buying one. Or baking cookies from scratch instead of picking up a couple dozen from the Wal-Mart bakery.

Also, as we run a daycare and most of our parents are teachers, we find ourselves taking a rather juvenile interest in the school delays and closings. An extra half-hour in the morning is wonderful when you have to get up at 6:30, which I know isn't SUPER early, but I am not a morning person. At all. I've never been a morning person. I doubt it will ever seep into my blood. So, that extra few minutes (few hours, if there's a closing) is a blessing.

That being said, I will be done.

Bob, finally

A couple days ago I mentioned my friend Bob. He's one of the most interesting people I've ever met and I have had the honor of living with him, not once, but twice. I will now share some stories about Bob.

Bob used to be super-duper stubborn and angry. If things weren't going his way he would stop talking to everyone and one time he decided he would rather walk two and a half miles than ride in a car with a girl he liked who talked to someone else more than she talked to him. Complicated, I know, but I decided that he needed to talk about it to someone and that that someone should be me. So, we set out for my mom's house, where we both lived. It was about 11 o'clock at night and warmish. I lived in a teeny tiny town in the Amish community of Northeast Indiana. Between the house we were leaving and the house where we were living was not a lot. Some livestock stationed in dark fields. Some very dark buildings which seemed to lean over the road down which we walked. Lots of imagined creepy things with sharp teeth and a lust for human brains. That sort of thing.

Anyway, about five minutes after leaving in a super mature huff, Bob started in on what was bugging him. I don't remember what it was now and as it was a personal, private conversation that took place about twelve years ago I am not at liberty to share. But he ranted angrily for about ten minutes or so and then calmed down. Then it started to rain. Ha-ha, won't we laugh about it later, we both said. Then it rained harder. And a little harder. And it didn't stop until about two minutes after we stepped through my mom's front door.

We have yet to have the conversation which leads to us laughing about that long, chaffing walk through the haunted Amish countryside in the warm summer rain.

I will tell more Bob stories later.

space-bound radio transmissions

Sometimes I feel like this blog is as rewarding as sending radio transmissions into deep space. It will literally be millions of years before it reaches any intelligent ears. And assuming it was picked up on some alien HAM radio somewhere in the far reaches of the galaxy, would they know what to do with it? Would they have the technology to respond? Would it just be passed off as some juvenile practical joke? Or would it be received with the utmost seriousness, treated with the respect and gravity it deserves? Would a room filled with wizened creatures in robes (like in Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure) discuss the best course of action? How long would it take? Suppose they decide to pay us a visit. Suppose the nations of this alien planet pool their resources and develop technology which would enable them to make the trip in half the time it took the radio transmissions. By the time they reach Earth we'll have nuked everything to cinders and a new species will have risen from the ashes and developed a brand-new civilization and they won't know what the heck these aliens are talking about. How embarrassing.

That's kind of how I feel about blogging.

It used to be Brad Pitt, but now...

I freakin' love Paul Giamatti. He's chubby and bald and delicious. Mmmm.

I first really noticed P.G. in American Splendor. He is unbelievable. Just amazing. And although no one really liked it, Lady in the Water was incredible, mostly due to P.G.

I did not care for Sideways.

I watched Fred Claus last night (Betsy has a little crush on Vince Vaughn). It was okay. Of course, I loved P.G. as Santa. Everyone else seemed like they were there while on break from a different, better movie which I'd actually like to see.

Mmmm. Paul Giamatti. Sounds like some kind of chilled Italian dessert. Some kind of dessert.

the children

My wife and I have two kids. Two of us, two of them. I feel that you couldn't have a better ratio. Betsy disagrees. She wants to have another baby. I don't know how I feel, exactly, but we've been trying for a few months now and I've just not felt right about it. I think it may be the timing. I have a hard enough time getting anything done with two kids. And the time for getting things done for me is almost gone. If I'm ever going to get published or even finish a novel (the one sent back to me by an uninterested publisher is still in the envelope-I haven't even reread the thing, I'm so disgusted by it) I need to do it soon. I'm already comfortable with my failures and adding extra responsibility to the mix can only work against me.

Betsy is super-organized. She can do ten things at once and they all work for her. She can scrapbook, talk on the phone, watch the kids, plan a week's worth of meals, and juggle chainsaws all at the same time. I can't sit down at my computer without being afraid that the Solitaire demon will distract me from my task.

So, having voiced my concerns to my wife, she is none too happy with me. To say that she's furious might be pushing it, but it's in the ballpark. It's been very cold around here.

It's not that I don't love our kids and it's not that I wouldn't love a third (I was a third, so I know how great they can be) but I just don't know if I can be a good husband and father and father and father AND a writer. I'm a man of very limited resources. And patience.

Anyway... that's that.

Christmas movies

It seems that the older I get the worse the holiday movies get. I'm not sure if they've always been bad and I'm just becoming more and more aware of the storytelling formula or if they are, in fact, getting worse.

I'm not talking about the Grinch and Charlie Brown and all those. Those are like scripture. I mean the Christmas with the Cranks and the Elfs and the holiday movies that try so very, very hard to hit that elusive calendar-themed home run. They all become so predictable and so very, very lame.

The more I think about it, it isn't just holiday movies. There are fewer and fewer movies these days that make me feel like I've spent my time well having watched them. Comedies aren't funny anymore, dramas aren't dramatic, action movies are so unbelievable as to require relableing them as comedies, academy nods are unreliable, romance is replaced with lust.

It's all really irritating. It really is.

The fan has hit the fan.

Running a daycare is really hard. It wears on you psychologically more than physically. We watch 12 kids from 6:30 to 4:30 Monday through Friday. When the weekend comes all you want to do is relax and have a little peace and quite and not have to take care of anyone for a while. But that's really the trick, isn't it? I mean, I love my kids more than life itself, but it seems like we never get a break from each other (I'm not so disillusioned that I can ignore the fact that I can be a tremendous pain in the butt sometimes). Two days a week Jack goes to preschool, but the rest of the time he's with his parents and I think it's starting to drive him nuts.

And how would you like to spend your weekends relaxing at work? It's getting harder and harder to separate House from Daycare. There are too many stains on our carpet for us to forget what we do during the week.

I'm not complaining. Don't think that. I'm just pointing out that right now I feel like hiding out in a cabin in the mountains where I can spend the next six months hibernating.

Saturday shenanigans

(insert sound effects if desired)

horses

Jack had a Christmas program at his preschool and they had horse-drawn sleigh rides. While the program was going on Macy kept looking out the window at the horses going through the school's front yard. At first she was curious, then she screamed whenever they went past. In the end she just put her head on my shoulder and whenever the horses came by she pretended to be asleep. It was pretty cute.

shaving day

Today was a shaving day. It's nothing weird. It's just that I have to shave my head every few days or it becomes very obvious how limited my options are. Anyway, shaving day means that my head will burn for the rest of the day and that I won't be able to wear a hat until tomorrow at the earliest. There's no stubble to hold my hat in place. Tomorrow evening I'll have just the right amount of stubble and you won't be able to get the hat off of my head. It's like some kind of super space-Velcro.

Yesterday would have been a perfect shaving day. It was in the forties. Today it's in the twenties. So now my head is burning and freezing all ot once and I'm starting to get dizzy.

If I had to choose between being bald, short, or fat I'd pick being short. Luckily for me, God is a generous Creator and I am blessed with all three.

today is Bob's birthday

Today is Bob's birthday. Bob is one of my favorite people in the world. He used to live with my mom and I absolutely ages and ages ago, until he walked in her fresh out of the shower, then he moved out.

Once Bob and I got lost in Ohio for about seven hours. It's a long story and it's after midnight, so technically not Bob's birthday anymore (sorry, dude) and I have to work in the morning so I'll tell it later. Hmm. This posting was a complete and total waste of my time. Thank you.

This is the beginning of the end, maybe.

I can't help but feel like I'm giving up. I have a blog. When I think of bloggers I think of people who have real jobs and political views who are always angry and generally know what they're talking about. Not guys like me. I'm a writer, for crying out loud. Just because I haven't been published or even completed anything other than our Christmas newsletter in recent history and just because I'm writing a comic book that will probably never get finished because I can't really draw and the one guy I know who CAN is just as lazy and unfocused as I am doesn't change the fact that I'm a writer and should have better things to do than this... which, I guess, is writing.

I'm really conflicted. Bear with me.

But I feel like this is me saying that I'm done. So let's get on with it.

I will now be very, very honest: I just want to talk about myself. I will do a lot of that and you will do a lot of being amazed.

Buckle up.