Facie’s Ramblings

J is in sixth grade. She is of an age when most kids do not believe in Santa. In fact, I would guess in her class pretty much no one does; most kids gave that up in fourth grade, some as late as fifth grade. But J? Well, on my birthday last week, after she found out there was no elf that flew away each night and came back every morning (because she straight-out asked me, and I will not lie), I figured she might have stopped believing in the fat guy in the red suit. But she is my daughter, so I knew there was an even better chance that she figured that just because one thing was not true, that did not necessarily mean the other mythical creatures were not real. [When, sometime between fourth and fifth grade, I found out there was no Santa, I refused to ask my parents about the Easter Bunny or Tooth Fairy. Even though I knew they probably were not real either, I decided to hold onto hope and get one more holiday out of it.] Yesterday, I took J to the Santa breakfast at our church becau...

My blog title is directly from Tim Allen's The Santa Clause movie. I watched it (and the next two installments) with my kid last week/this past weekend. I had forgotten how much I enjoyed that first movie; it came out in the mid '90s, when I was single, in my mid 20s, and had forgotten the magic of Christmas. But having a kid is a great reminder of the merriment, joy, and wonder of the season. The thing about the "Believing is seeing" quote is that it "works" for both the secular and religious part of the season (and life in general, I suppose). This Christmas I hope each of you can believe in something that you cannot see, whatever that may be. Merry Christmas!

I mostly believe in the power of prayer. I have no solid proof that praying for something or about someone actually works, but as a person of faith, albeit not of the rock-solid kind, I like to think it helps. And I don't see how it could hurt. Right? I am looking at you, my faithless/atheist/agnostic blogging friends (and I will really be looking at you at the end of this post as well). As I commented in another blog (probably in several blogs, actually, and perhaps even here), last year, a priest said that God answers our prayers, but not necessarily how we want them. I liked that thought. Well, not so much that it means I may not get what I want, but more so that it helps to explain why sometimes legions of people pray for something for days and weeks, and then it all seems for naught as they did not get what they so fervently prayed for. I can't say that if I prayed for something major, like the health of a loved one, and I did not get what I wanted, I would be okay with ...

Some of the kids in J's class have an "Elf on the Shelf." For the uninformed, an elf show up at children's houses around Thanksgiving. This guy or gal "lands" someplace and "watches" the kids to see how they act. Then at night, while the kids are sleeping, said elf "flies" back to Santa to give the big guy an update. The elf returns the next day, in another place in the house, and the Big Brother saga starts again. I wanted no part of this. Mostly because half the time the Tooth Fairy forgets to leave money or the Easter Bunny accidentally neglects to hide the eggs (because she is so tired from the 2.5-hour Easter vigil). But perhaps even more so because it is just one more "lie" I am telling J. And if there is one the thing my kid pretty much never does it is lie. So I can only imagine how our conversation will go once she finds out the cold, hard truth. Worth noting, is I often quote lines from the Virginia letter; I like to...

If you took the time to read my last blog post, then thanks. It was a long one. For that reason, I am going to summarize my latest thoughts, which come on the heels of my meeting with the teacher, in the next two sentences to spare you from reading the four paragraphs that follow: I am about 95 percent sure my child is telling the truth for all the reasons I stated in the last post. However, 5 percent of me still cannot understand/believe that two different girls would make up things about my child. I know I should probably just drop it. Move on. But as I said to Jordan, if I knew that someone said that I did something which I did not, then I would want to confront that person. I know I am not eight, but why is my kid not more bothered that another girl is supposedly making up things about her? Jordan said she does not want to talk to the girl because she is afraid the girl will then tell the teacher that Jordan is bothering her or threatening her. Valid points, I realize. But the...