We’ve canceled Christmas in our house this year. 

The preceding sentence might seem to be in conflict with the title, but, in our minds anyway, it’s not by a long stretch.

Surprisingly, canceling Christmas this year was actually the kid’s idea, but it is one that I can easily endorse.  The reason for this is multifold. 

First of all, it will be our first Christmas without Suzy running around, hanging tinsel and being Santa’s Little Insane Elf.  Even if I had that much ambition, I’ve never had her “Christmas Cheer” so it would be stupid to even try.  Additionally, watching their mother do the annual “Christmas Blitzkrieg” was always great fun for the kids and they have expressed their desire to retain the fond memories of those times, as opposed to trying to recreate something we all know that we can’t.      

Secondly, although the girls are as materialistic as the next pre-teens, they also have grown up with a tremendous sense of their places in the world.  They KNOW that, even though they have had to face the trials and tribulations of having “two mommies”, that they are adored and cherished,  that they have been lucky enough to have been born into a family that can and will provide all of the tangible things they could ever want and that they are more blessed than the vast majority of kids in the U.S. today.   

So this year, instead of spending hundreds of dollars on a big tree and presents, my two wonderful kids want us to use that money to make some other people’s Christmas better. 

We are going to do just that.   

We have done our research and have identified a couple of shelters for victims of domestic violence in our area that can use our help.  In each of these shelters are families that will have no Christmas to speak of because they have been forced to flee their homes and seek refuge, often with nothing but what is on their backs. 

These women and their children might have had to run for their lives, but we are going to do our damnest to see that they have warm winter clothes and that the kids have toys on Christmas morning. 

I’m damn proud of my kids, in case you can’t tell.  They are both of an age where they could easily be involved only with themselves, their friends, their school and their iPods, but instead THEY are willing to forgo their own pleasures to reach out to those less fortunate. 

My kids make me humble with admiration and ever so proud because they truly understand the Spirit of Christmas.

P.S.  I AM going to make sure that they have a couple of little stocking stuffers for their own Christmas morning.  My initial inclination was to buy them presents anyways, but I’m not going to because that would kind of diminish their sacrifice.   They have already given themselves the best gift there is anyways…  the gift of compassion and caring.