Christmas  morning

It's funny.  I love you.  It's not funny that I love you.  It's just funny that at home, our home, I would never be able to stand this.  Just laying here like this.  But here…here, it is different.  I've been awake for over an hour, but I still haven't opened my eyes.  I don’t need to.

I can tell time without looking at a clock, or watch, or any other available time-piece.  It's something I've been able to do since I was a kid.  My mom would say that I would have to be home at 6 and no matter where I was or what I was doing, I would just stop and go home.  I would walk in the door, look at the clock ... 6 on the nose.  No watch, no sundial or reading shadows off a street light, nothing.  It's a gift. 

So, I have been awake for 1 hour and 23 minutes, but I still haven't opened my eyes.  We are sleeping in my childhood bed, in my childhood home, and my parents love you.  Your leg is around me, your arm is around me, and I can feel your drool on my back.  I'm uncomfortable, I'm hot as hell, and I want to scream ... And as I lie here, with my eyes closed, in a tiny bed where I had sex for the first time, I don't want this moment to end.

Christmas has changed for me.  It isn’t as fun anymore.  Ever since grade 2, when I discovered that Santa wasn’t real, and that all my mother did was leave some crumbs on the plate and put the cookies back in the jar, it just hasn’t been the same.  But the thought of recreating that magic with our own child, makes me excited again that a marketing tool by Coca-cola really caught on. 

Then I start to smell my mom's homemade buttermilk pancakes.  Okay, time to wake up.  Moments can't last forever.  I tap your arm, you lift your head, and slurp up a decent dose of saliva, saying something I can't understand.  I kiss you on your forehead and think about how you will react when you open your present.  Your hair's a mess, your wearing my yellow and brown gym uniform from middle school, and your breath smells of the entire loaf of garlic cheese bread you ate last night.  I have never been more in love with you in my life.