I'll take whatever you can give me.....

As you may imagine, the Christmas has the potential of being very emotional and a downer for me. When the holiday season started, however, I found myself being excited. I couldn't explain why, I was just excited....

Being in the situation I'm in, I've found myself trying to reach my kids. Show them that I love them in whatever way I can. My time with them is limited. I have to pack a lot in. Reaching Sarah has been easier than reaching Chris. Sarah and I are a lot alike in personality. I think it's because we are both youngest children. I saw a video series by Kevin Leman called the Birth Order Book. He makes a great case about how much of your personality is determined by your birth order relative to your siblings...

Anyway, I had to delay Christmas shopping this year because I was waiting on some checks from my clients. A check finally came Friday. Christmas was finally on...

Chris and Sarah both love music....which is great. Chris loves to play guitar hero which taught him to love classic rock which is the music that I grew up on. It's one of the ways that I connect with him. Sarah loves music too....but she likes the more modern styles. Being a frustrated musician, I've always wanted to help my kids translate their love of listening to music into a love for making music. Chris took piano lessons several years ago. He has innate musical ability, but he hated every minute of it. He loves athletics, that's cool.

Sarah has never had the opportunity to take music lessons. We tried several times, but couldn't get it worked out. Over the past few months she's expressed an interest in playing guitar. I told her that one of my goals, is to play something with her at her school's annual talent show. I don't know if she'll ever get up the nerve to perform in public. We'll see...

Anyway, so back to the Christmas story...yesterday mornining, I went to the music store that is close by. I had been in their several times just browsing around. Passing a music store for me is about as hard as passing a Starbucks. Anyway, I finally was ready to buy something....I bought a beautiful red electric guitar. It's not a brand name, but it is gorgeous. I bought a small amplifier, it is really cool because is has a headphone jack and a separate input for an mp3 player. I can make some tracks for her to practice with, or she can plug her zune in and learn to play along with her favorite song. It's cool....really cool. I bought some good headphones (so that she can practice anytime, without me getting in trouble with her mom).

The kids will be with me all week, so I went ahead and gave them the guitar stuff. I figure we can play together this week so that they can learn some stuff with me before they go home. Sarah loved it, Chris wouldn't admit to it, but I think he loved it too. I'm hoping that they'll both use it. But the thing was, it really didn't reach Chris as a gift like I hoped it would. I was in a bit of a dilemma.

God, in his infinite wisdom, handed me an opportunity to reach Chris. Chris has a lot of friends, and a lot of them invite him to go with them to events and stuff. Last night, a friend texted him and invited him to go to the Titans game today. We were plotting and planning what to do since the high temp was to be 31 today. I told him, go to bed (he was going to have to get up at 6am, these guys make the Titans game an all day event) and I'll get you some longjohns. Off to Walmart I go...

While I was there, I realized the opportunity that I had been given. In addition to longjohns, I bought a Titans sweatshirt, thermal socks, a cool hat, gloves and a thermal jacket. I laid it out by the fireplace and told Chris "Santa came last night" when he woke up. Chris is a funny guy, he is very emotional about somethings, very stoic about others. However, I think I hit a home run because he said "I like that jacket". He had also never owned a pair of thermal socks.

We spent a few minutes together by the fire this morning before he left. We talked, I think we connected. That is very important to me. He is excited about today. I'm very happy that he gets to go, and that it provided me the opportunity to connect with him.

The other cool thing is, now Sarah and I get to spend the day today learning to play guitar....