Cotter’s Corner

Okay, so it’s the thirty first of December and one of my favorite things happens today. The beginning of the Twilight Zone marathon on Sci-Fi.

“Willoughby… Where a man can walk, slow down and live his life full measure”

I’m not sure why I love this episode so much, maybe it’s just because I like to cheer for the underdog. The guy in it is so down trodden… so… abused by the man. He’s a good dude. And he finally gets his.

It’s just a neat time of the year anyway. I hope to see some of my other favorite episodes (sorry I don’t know the name – but I do know the big ones). Burgess Meredith as the devil and the printing press that makes news, the episode with the painter girl and the two suns. It’s just really great stuff. My family all sits around and watches it too. It’s one of those New Years traditions.

So, I’ve been off for five days (if you include the weekend) and I’m absolutely loving it. It’s Wednesday and so far so good. I’ve been very lazy and it makes me very happy. I’ll have to pay the piper here soon with some house work, but I’m trying to put that off as much as I can.

Christmas was excellent. A good time was had by all and the kids did well. We’ll be heading to Books-a-Million soon to let the kids spend some of their hard-earned Christmas loot. And we’ll be heading up to see my Dad as well. Seems he dropped the bucket from a front-end loader on top of his foot on Tuesday and his foot has been 8 times its normal size ever since. So, we’ll be visiting him soon and taking him some of his favorite things (aside from the grandkids of course): Rice Pudding and assorted other puddings.

I went and woke her up this morning and I think most of the drama was her being tired and me being shocked by being caught. She seemed pretty okay this morning, but did ask me “How I knew to be the toothfairy”. I told her that it was something that all adults knew to do. And that seemed to be pretty okay. She also wanted to know if we kept all her teeth. She seemed happy to know we kept them and she got really happy when Robyn told her that she could help us be the tooth fairy for her new little sister. So, one night of trauma over with. Hopefully not too many more to come.

Okay, so a really significant event happened tonight. My daughter caught me putting money under her pillow to replace her two teeth that she lost. I was being the “tooth fairy”.

It was horrible.

Probably one of the worst days of my entire life. Sound melodramatic? It isn’t. I was completely and totally at a loss to explain anything and my daughter was so upset and crying and I had nothing to offer, I was shellshocked. I tried to come up with some lame excuse about the toothfairy not coming for teeth that the dentist had to pull, but it was lame and she knew it. She was already tired from her day at the dentist and it was just all around bad news. She wouldn’t stop crying, proclaiming the fact that there was no tooth fairy as “the saddest thing she ever heard”.

Once again, shellshock. I had nothing. I felt utterly and completely useless. It was beyond even that, it made me upset. Upset that I carried on this charade with my daughter who now doesn’t trust me. She thinks I lie to her. That’s probably the worst thing about all of this is that I’m so completely lost for what to do now that I can’t think of anything. I am a firm believer in children hanging on to the “magic” of their childhood, but it was literally like a part of me died tonight while I was standing there. I disappointed her more than she has ever been disappointed in her life. And there is no one to blame but myself. I have perpetrated this lie, willingly and without giving a thought to what would happen in the end. And now, it has ended and I can’t even put into words the heartache I feel. I have just let down the person in this world that means the most to me. It’s a terrible feeling. My son never had this, there was never a feeling that I was betraying him, even once he caught on – he just kind of went with the flow. But Maureen is a different animal, and so young, so smart. Too smart for her (and my) own good.

No, I don’t plan on telling her about Santa Claus, if that’s what you are wondering. But tomorrow I’m going to be a different person in her eyes and I can’t come to grips with that at this point. You see, once the magic is gone there is nothing left but the utter crap that is the world today. And I guess that is what upsets me the most. The innocence and the magic are slowly but surely going to be gone and I’m going to be left there, a big fat blubbering idiot. I’m upset FOR HER. It’s like the start of the whole entire chain of events. Ugh. Okay, I’ll stop talking about this now.

I wish there could always be magic.