The Tradëscan Codex

I am entirely Christmas ovleehrwmed. But I am here and present and not dwelling on what my brother's life would be if we had come to live with this family 5 or 10 yrs ago. A year ago when I went back to the church where I met my family, I was vacationing with Aunt Betsy and trying to move back to Austin for good. The last few months in El Paso were more and more violent and I went to Christmas eve last year with my arm in a sling, tape across my ribs and lots of bruises all over me. I am in a completely different place in every single area of my life.My career as a journalist starts this week. Not just blogging. But career. And I have been floating all day about that stuff. It looked like my first article would be a Christmas post, but instead it will be a teen retrospective on the teen/kid-centered stories the corporate media failed to focus on properly. For now, the two stories will be the balloon boy and Levi Johnston and the thread that the media missed each time is the effects of incarceration on the children of convicts, Big stuff. Big magazines you've all heard of.This big family Christmas stuff is awesome and better than any movie, and I want to package it and bring it with me forever.Between presents and clothes and cookies and labeling stuff for Santa Bruce and Cassie Pupps and then how many virtual farm presents I can open while she's asleep and how many I have to save for sister.And there's things like dishes and cleaning and wrapping real presents. And I have to sweep and get the kitchen table ready before breakfast.And big sister (junior at Rice college) has her own manger scene stuff that is supposed to fit under the tree but it's spilling out onto the Santa Train that runs around the living room. All you bumz have been with me the whole year. From the first night at my host family when I was scared to leave my room at night because I had been told to wear a (nonexistent) bathrobe when I did. You bumz knew that no one here would judge me for not owning the robe, but they would help me find an alternative that was modest enough for everyone to feel comfortable.