Parents behind the eight-ball at Christmas

Appeared Dec. 4, 2006

It’s almost Christmas and we all want to give each of our children a “Red Ryder BB Gun” moment.
But granting a fondest wish, like the one Ralphie got in “A Christmas Story,” is a tough thing for a parent to accomplish because you have to have a child who wants something so badly he speaks of little else in the weeks leading up to Christmas.
And there is a very narrow window of opportunity because there are only a couple years when a kid is old enough to want something very badly but young enough to have not yet copped the teenage entitlement attitude. And when they are older than that, they have already learned they don’t always get everything they wish for.
Sadly, it never happened with my two boys. I don’t know ... they never wanted anything so badly they could burst.
Not that I didn’t try. I stood in line at Toys “R” Us at 6 a.m. to get the elusive Marshmallow Man “Ghostbusters” action figure for my younger son.
And my older son ... well, he was not only our first child, he was the first grandchild on both sides. His pile of presents was so high on his third Christmas that he was too overwhelmed to even go near it without some serious coaxing. I don’t think he ever wanted for anything.
But I remember my own Ralphie moment. I must have been about 12.
Of course, I was a greedy Ralphie. I wanted two things: A Spirograph and a tape recorder.
Remember Spirographs? You made beautiful geometric designs by putting a pen tip in a gear that fit inside of a larger ring you had pinned to a piece of paper. It was amazing to me.
And the tape recorder I got had two reels inside of it and I had to actually thread the tape through one of the wheels to get it started. I taped music off the radio and my little would-be Barbra Streisand sister taped herself making up songs (much to her later embarrassment).
It was a great Christmas.
This year, I’m predicting a Ralphie moment for my 7-year-old nephew Ryan.
Ryan is the third child - first boy - of one of my brothers.
And Ryan wants a pool table.
Yes, it’s a little more expensive than Ralphie’s Red Ryder - but what do kids know about things like that?
And guess who inadvertently introduced Ryan to the game of pool.
Yep, Aunt Pat. That’s me.
His arm was in a cast this summer - he had hopped a fence to retrieve a baseball - when all his cousins were splashing around in our pool.
Bored with watching his cousins try to kill themselves (or each other) as they jumped off the diving board, Ryan went looking for some other way to amuse himself.
He found the pool table, picked up a cue stick and became a different kind of shark than his aquatic cousins.
Then it started.
“Can we get a pool table?”
“When are we going to get a pool table like Aunt Pat’s?”
Soon his parents realized they couldn’t deny Ralphie, er, I mean Ryan his fondest Christmas wish.
Shhh. Don’t tell Ryan but the pool table sits unassembled undercover in his basement.
And now it’s his parents - not Ryan - who are ready to burst waiting for Christmas morning.
Anticipating that Ralphie moment when it becomes crystal clear why it truly is better to give than receive.