How My ADHD Saved Christmas
Tell me I’m not the only one who finds Elf on a Shelf creepy? Like, clowns-level creepy. I hated him as a child.
In 2005, some asshat got the genius idea to write a book and remarket him to a new generation. The Elf saw dizzying heights of renewed popularity. I am a small business owner. I was never like the Pinterest moms, creating those little vignettes of Elf-on-a-Shelf snowball fights with flour and mini-marshmallows. My household creates enough messes. I wasn’t about to create more. But my son Jack would have loved it if I had.
Jack was infected by the mass psychosis obsessed with the Elf on a Shelf. He had to have one. I begrudgingly broke down and bought one. But Jack wanted it year-round, not just for the holiday season. He named it “Elfred.” Jack would sweetly greet Elfred each morning, day in and day out, 365 days a year.
Elfred sat atop our fridge wearing this tiny crown I fashioned from cutting the bottom of a styro-foam cup. It even had little crowny points. Elfred was not an attractive elf. His little red suit was stained from lots of play time. This included a stain of dried whipping cream. (This would have been an authentic touch, had I recreated of those gross Elfred-Barbie orgy vignettes I’ve seen in memes.)
It was the 2010 holiday season. Jack was six. Dave had the cute idea of buying Jack his very first iPod. Back then, you could pay extra to get engraving on the back, so Dave did, dedicating this iPod to Jack from Jack’s beloved Elfred. Dave bought fancy parchment paper and printed a beautiful letter from Elfred in gold lettering. The font he chose was royal looking — very official. Dave made a few attempts at printing out the Elfred letter before getting it just right. He tore up the beta versions and tossed them in his art studio garbage can.
In my writers’ community, this is what we would call “the inciting incident.”
Christmas of 2010 went off without a hitch. Jack loved his iPod from Elfred. He would beam with love at Elfred whenever he walked passed our fridge. Jack wanted me to save Elfred’s special parchment letter with its gold lettering. Jack watched me carefully fold it up and place it inside of the decorative box I kept on our coffee table. Jack was very sentimental.
But then the train went off the rails...
Jack was bored. He headed down to Dave’s art studio to see if Daddy would play with him. It was then that he saw the familiar parchment paper — Elfred’s letter — all torn up in pieces, sticking up and out of Dave’s over-stuffed garbage can.
I was upstairs working when I got the frantic call from Dave. He’s soft-hearted and was literally sobbing: “I’ve ruined Christmas! Jack is lying on the floor howling in pain. He saw the old Elfred letters I tore up!”
Moments like this are made for ADHD super powers.
Yes, I know plenty of ADHDers deplore that term: Super Power. I kind of do, too. I use it sparingly. I’m as intimately familiar with the dark side of ADHD as I am the happy side. But let’s face it:
We ADHDers are fan-f*cking-tastic in a crisis.
We’re calm. Hyper-focused. Idea hamsters.
I was cool as a cucumber. (I assume this phrase refers to refrigerated cucumbers, because I know from personal experience, cucumbers can be hot when you pick them in the garden on a 90-degree day.)
I reassured Dave. “No problem. Just send him upstairs. I have the fix.”
Dave was not reassured. This was the pre-ADHD diagnosis phase of my life. Dave was more used to me creating chaos with my disruptive pranks, not resolving it. I heard this tone to his voice, half-daring me: “What are you gonna do?”
My friend Mushroom Lynn used that same tone of voice with me once when she asked me the same question. We were working at the Pulitzer-Voice newspaper together early in our careers. Dining and Entertainment was my beat, so I got us invited to the grand opening of Walter Payton’s Thirty Four’s A Sporty Place club. Mushroom Lynn dared me to walk into the cordoned-off VIP Lounge. “What are you gonna do?” I answered her by rushing forward through the doorway with my fake Louis Vuitton purse, entering the celebrity no-go zone. Mushroom Lynn followed suit, lost her footing, and stumbled right into the lap of paralyzed New England Patriot’s football player Darryl Stingley, who was sitting patiently in his wheelchair, bemused by these two crazy girls. Even his wife laughed at us.
“I’m going to show Jack the power of Christmas MAGIC. Just TRUST me.”
Jack emerged from the basement with his little tear-stained face, the tear droplet shapes populating his little-boy shirt. With the flourish of a TV chef lifting the silver dome off of some hummingbird’s-eyebrow-under-glass cuisine, I lifted the lid from the coffee table box. There was Elfred’s letter, still in pristine condition.
“Look, Jack! It’s Christmas MAGIC! Elfred fixed your letter! It’s a Christmas MIRACLE!”
Jack was jumping up and down, hugging me with one arm, the Elfred letter in his other hand. “It’s a Christmas MIRACLE!” he echoed.
Dave watched the scene unfold, still recovering from the turn of events. “I’m going back to work,” he groused. The drama was over.
It wasn’t until just before Easter of Jack’s 10th year — with me still undiagnosed — that I impulsively blurted out the words that destroyed Jack’s belief in Santa, the Easter Bunny, and Elfred.
Last I checked, he still believes in GOD and our Christian faith, so I didn’t totally ruin him.