Hello to All!
Well, here it is again. Another year has passed and my yearly and beloved Christmas letter is at-hand! I hope this finds you all blessed by the gods you love the most and more importantly the gods who love you the most! We’ve had one heck of a year here at the Soiseth Ranch!
Olivia (6) started school at La Etoile du Nord (no idea what that means), the French immersion school here in St. Paul, and was immediately propelled to the front of her class (she sits right near the door). She’s learning math, science, civics and all the rest – and all teaching is in French! We’re not sure what she’ll learn in English, but we hope that the French are the nice ones and not the ones who hate the English for that class. We’re pretty certain she’s doing great! But are struggling reading to her and helping her with any homework as we don’t have any idea what in Gay Paris any of it means!
She still struggles, as does her little brother Ben (3), with simple English phrases like “Eat what’s on your plate”, “Clean your room”, “Stop hitting”, “Stop biting”, “Stop stabbing” and “For the love of God, Kid, Think!!” They’re simple phrases so we’re certain both will soon cotton to them and stop killing one another slowly, with their hands, toys, lamps, sculpture and, well, anything else in our lovely and warm home her on good old Como Place.
Ben is doing great also. He’s in pre-school at North Como Pre-School, which is housed in North Como Presbyterian Church, and while we’re both worried he’ll be brainwashed by all the hooky religion business, we’re also hoping some of that old fire and brimstone, you’ll burn in hell, Old Testament bible will rub off on him. “The kid’s got spunk” is what we like to say. That, and “Ritalin’s not too far away”, we figure. We had a teacher conference recently (imagine that! Teacher conference for a three-year-old!) and the teacher, Miss Lisa, held our hands and told us just how much she appreciated all we did and that she was thinking about us pretty much every hour he wasn’t in school. She said she spent that time focused on him! He’s getting extra special attention! The best and brightest always do! She wept a bit and led us to the door. It was quite a meeting. Sad news: Miss Lisa recently had to quit to “explore other opportunities”. We wish her well in the new year!
Jana’s wonderful as well. She’s gotten sooo good at pointing out when I forget what she tells me! And although her uncle, Denny, pointed out that she might be doing that even when she never said a thing to slowly break me down and eventually play me like a marionette to do her bidding until the day I die, I’m pretty sure that’s not true! Or, at least, Jana told me that I forgot that he said, “Just kidding!” right after that. He probably did. I probably forgot.
Me? Oh, who cares? Okay, I still love Budweiser as much as anything else and my Man Cave is really coming along! I pretty much spend every waking hour that I’m not at work down here! Sure, I can hear the screaming and fighting upstairs, the dishes crashing and the feet stomping, the fire detector going off and that hiss of the extinguisher, but if I crank up my tunes, it all goes away! So, I’ll crank it up, crack open another Bud and toast all of you – those I love the most – more even than all my Facebook friends, all 187 of whom I truly adore. Here’s my toast: May the new year bring more of the same!
Merry Christmas!
Luke Soiseth 