Just Found Perfect Christmas Gifts For Kids

Doggie Doo. You feed it, squeeze the leash, and it poops. So simple. So funny. This will entertain kids and dads for hours.

Ant Farm Revolution. I have three words: Hyp. No. Tized.

What to Buy for Your Hubbie (I Believe in Shopping)

I have decided that I believe in shopping, as a core value. You know, honesty, hard work, learning... and shopping.

No really. Though it is important that I also believe in thrift and industry. And it is important that I say "shopping" instead of "consuming." I believe that having a "shopping" mindset about choosing a college (or whether to go to college at all), choosing a major, choosing an employer, choosing a spouse, is a moral good. When you are shopping, you are seeking value and quality. You want to know how it fits, how long it will last. You are skeptical of the sales person's unproven claims, until proof is provided.

I believe in shopping.

That said, for wives reading my blog, here's a Christmas shopping list for men:

The Compulsaries

1. Brooks Brothers Non-Iron shirt (if its not Brooks Brothers, it's a dish rag)
2. REI smart wool socks (for dress and casual, comfort rules)
3. Tie (don't buy a tie)
4. A casual watch (Timex--cheap, but good)

It's a Guy Thing

1. Big belt buckle (Ladies, you have to suck it up on this one. Sometimes guys just need a big belt buckle with a duck on it. We think it's awesome. You don't. Deal with it.)

A Little Luxury

1. Money clip (The giant butt-bulge wallet A) looks ridiculous and B) is filled with things he will never actually use or need again, he's just a crazy wallet pack-rat)

The Full Blown Luxuries

1. Mont Blanc pen (Men on the move feel cool when they sign things with a classy pen. Silly but true.)
2. A not-so-casual watch (Bond. James Bond.)

For The Traveler

1. Fragrance pellets (Keep the locker room out of the luggage)

Where are you, Christmas?

Where are you Christmas? Why can't I find you?

There are no Christmas lights in Islamabad. No fragrant evergreens. No mistletoe. Not a wreath nor an ornament.

I shop the markets--drab, broken cement on the outside, ornate spectacles on the inside. Shopkeepers serve tea as they rehearse the benefits of wool from this part of the goat's neck and that part of Uzbekistan. I crease carpet after carpet to inspect knot counts.

I lean in close, evaluating claims of natural dyes and seeking design asymmetries that will convey authenticity. Instead, I see Katie and kids. The quest for quality, I discover, is the essence of love. 

How can I know, dear shopkeeper, for myself, whether your claims are accurate? No. This won't do. I'm looking for Christmas. Next shop please.

My world is changing. I'm rearranging. Does that mean Christmas changes too?

I have touched a hundred pashmina scarves by now. Two-ply. Four-ply. I ask about their supply chain. I ask about their design. But I don't know. What is real? What will last? Which one is worth the price?

I know what looks good. I know what feels good. Alas, I have been deceived by those impostors many times. I want to follow it from it's source. Let me see the goat, watch it sheered. Let me observe the loom, the weaving, the extracting of dye from pomegranate and saffron. Then I will know.

But, says the shopkeeper, you would still have to trust us that we have the best goats.

Where are you Christmas? Do you remember the one you used to know?

I hold a scarf to my face to feel the texture. Something about it reminds me. Almost, I feel Christmas. Almost, I am eight years old, sitting under a blanket early in the morning staring at the lights on the Christmas tree. I squint and blur them into eternity. It seemed Christmas would never come. Yet it also seemed it would never end. 25 days until I see my children. Once again, I am waiting for Santa.

At length, I make purchases. A leather bag. A scarf. Carved jewelry box. I still don't know. I won't know until I have experience. I inspected. I probed. But I still didn't know. I won't know until I live with these products for a season. The purchase is the final research. The leap of faith.

Christmas is here, everywhere. Christmas is here, if you care.

Black Friday, Islamabad

Texture matters

Crease to inspect knot count

Custom-made genuine leather carryall: $70

High-end pashmina

Inspecting the tailor's fabric

My Pakistani Thanksgiving

Giving Thanks

U.S. Taxpayers, thank you for my job. Here's what I'm doing with it: link

See the Nov. 23 report.

Powam, by Madeline Hart (age 7)

I will show my self wher I want to be
and then I will know what to do in my life
to see the world and peac of love
I will stand throu the life of me

She wrote this a few months ago, unprompted, uncoached. I love it.

A Dad and His Finances

I used to be real tight wad (Katie rolls her eyes). My answer to all economic questions was "spend less."

Katie's "earn more" response was foreign and at first struck me as born of questionable morality. So I set about spending less. Less and less and less. Ever less. This made it ever more difficult to earn more. I didn't understand investment. I didn't understand value. I didn't understand abundance.

Katie and I collided magnificently. We were like The Bonfire of the Vanities version of "Tastes great!" "Less Filling!" I demanded less spending. She demanded more earning.

Eventually I came around to her side (Katie rolls her eyes). In some respects, I saw her "earn more" and raised it a "spend more."

My children profoundly changed my spending philosophy. I started thinking things like, We don't get a mulligan on first grade. (Katie says, "You just started thinking that, or did someone explain it to you?") And immediately my sense of an appropriate housing expense tripled.

At times we have been faced with such trade offs as: dance lessons or retirement savings? To my surprise, the decision was easy. I can work until I'm 80 if that's what it takes to get these kids to their potential and to have experiences with them.

I recognize that the slope is slippery. But at the same time, I just keep thinking about the meaning of "rich." I don't want to be rich so much as I want to live richly. Money is just a worthless piece of paper unless you buy something with it. Unless you spend it, money will not help you live richly. Money must be exchanged for value. Value is the thing, not money.

So I believe not only in earning more but in spending more. How's that for moral depravity?

But you must spend on the right things. Buy value. Beware diminishing returns. Invest heavily in human capital first. Despise waste.

I will admit that for me the line between ambition and greed, investment and indulgence, is often blurry. My earlier answer to this dilemma was to shun ambition so as to never be faced with such moral ambiguities. Alas, this is its own form of immorality.

I want nothing like I want my children to be happy and productive. This desire has made clear that there is no moral triumph on the sideline.

For me, there is this strange truth: My children need me to make myself successful. How shall they know the way, lest I should show them?

Hairy Men Used To Be Cool

Now I'm supposed to wax my chest? My commitment to fashion goes only so far. I'm bringing back the Chuck Norris Lone Wolf McQuade look.

That does force me to reconsider my Chuck Norris/Katie analogy. My psyche can't handle it. Nope. That's a bad analogy.

If Selene from Underworld gave up killing Lycans in favor of raising three kids, she'd try to be like Katie.

That's better. She is almost as pretty as my wife.

Christmas Agenda

Yes, it's that time. Besides, I've been planning it for months.

When I get off the plane we are racing directly to Maddie's dance recital. Then to purchase a tree. Then I'm going to eat a lot of Trader Joe's pumpkin ice cream. Seriously, get some.

Pumpkin is sort of the perfect food. Take anything, add pumpkin, and you'll have something delicious.

Decorate the tree day two. Ginger bread house (we buy the kit--did you think I was going to make ginger bread?), baking and delivering "crinkle cookies" day three.

Christmas to New Year's is filled with ice skating, Christmas light hunting, and Egypt preparations.

Yesterday, I informed Caleb and Henry that I called Santa's "Moms and Dads Only" hotline. I spoke with the Head Elf and, so far, all systems are go for everything they requested. They are confirmed on the Nice List. This elicited leaping, and then a request to reprise our "Juice Box Hero" jam session.

Obliged.

Easy For Me To Say

You may recall a few blogs ago when I got kind of "Good Morning America" about my kids hanging on every word of my letters. I may even have used the phrase "like a treasure."

It may be that Katie is just very generous in reporting the facts on the ground. I'm like CENTCOM and she is Delta Force. Katie is the mom version of Chuck Norris (the cool 1980s pre-Mike Huckabee version), but with Meryl Streep's looks (again, the 1980s version). I know Meryl Streep is not always considered a sex symbol, but a) Katie really looks like her, and b) go watch some old Streep films; she's hotter than you remember. And the CENTCOM analogy implies that I'm in charge of something while clearly I'm not, OK, so just calm down and stop reading so much into this, other than that Katie is busting out the parenting equivalent of roundhouse kicks to face while I watch from a distance.

Anyway, I may start including more drawings and photos in my letters so as to move toward a reality in which "like a treasure" is a remotely plausible phrase.