In years past, I’ve held solitary gift wrapping marathons on Christmas Eve night when everyone else is asleep. Surrounded by wrapping paper, cats, a dog, and drinking copious amounts of hot chocolate, coffee, or Baileys (depending on my mood), while quietly listening to Christmas tunes, I would wrap and wrap and wrap like I was a demented cute little elf applying for the Head Elf job at Santa’s North Pole.

Well this year, since the kids are older and sneaking peeks into presents is no longer an issue (I think…), and the whole “Santa secret” has long been out of the bag, and more importantly, I suddenly found myself with some spare time…a unique dilemma I don’t often face, I decided to wrap presents a little early. It goes without saying that it was still somewhat of a chaotic undertaking.

My 23-year old son joined me for this manic tradition. Jake was impressed with my mad gift wrapping skills….I mean, my corners on those presents are tight!

Thinking I was clever, I mentioned his age and then bragged to him that of course I’m good at it because I’ve been enjoying this Christmas custom for at least 23 years. It took about 10 seconds for those words to leave my mouth before it hit me. I’ve been doing this for 23 years. And just like that…. I’m old. Damn.