Brotherhood

Like it is for many children, when I was small Christmas was the most exciting day of the year. My parents did the Santa Claus thing with my brothers and me. I know every family does this differently, but they simply set the gifts out a few hours before we thought about getting out of bed. No wrapping paper, just organized into a clump for each of us. It was the entry into the room that was the process of unwrapping for us I suppose. When we moved out of my Grandmother's house into our own house, Ben and I shared a room. It was here that we had one of our deepest bonds of brotherhood. Christmas eve night would fall on us, and we would lay in bed unable to fall asleep from excitement. It was here we would talk about all of the things we hoped we were getting and what we were going to play with first, but it was also a place where we started to scheme. I hope that anyone with siblings can relate to the relationship that comes out of mischief. Ben and I certainly could. We would get in our minds that every little noise we heard was Santa coming down the chimney to leave our gifts, and we youthfully thought we could catch him in the act. Every Christmas eve we made a score of attempts to catch him in the living room leaving gifts without waking our parents. These plans began to become fairly involved over the years and started to revolve around cookie baited traps. It was something Ben and I did together. When I moved into my own room across the hall it only increased. A new objective was added to Operation Catch Santa. We first had to get to each other, and then we had to work together on some devious plan. These are some of my fondest memories. A lot has come between Ben and me since, and the memories have certainly become fonder. My heart beats faster to look back on the days when all we had was Brotherhood.