Jingle All the Way

"I told you it was outside, Granma," Adella said.

And so it was. Marshall's favorite Christmas book, Jingle Bugs. For two days I had been looking for the book. I had sorted through three baskets of my one hundred Christmas books. (Yes, my Christmas book addiction is due for an intervention.) I looked under the couch and in the toy baskets. But it was just as Adella said. When the snow cleared, there was the book in the middle of my front lawn. According to Adella, Marshall had dropped the book on his way to the car. If only I had listened to her. If only she had just picked it up.

I am sad. This book is important. It is the first book that Marshall will sit and read with me cover to cover. I like to think it is because Granma's lap is warm and cuddly and my engaging rendition is worthy of a Grammy. But I know it is really because two-and-a half-year-old Marshall likes to be in control. He enjoys pulling the tab that reveals Santa Bug jumping out of the chimney. He likes lifting the beautifully wrapped present flap that reveals three different sizes of Gift-wrapped Bugs. He especially loves the final page, which has a yellow, shiny Starbug at the top of a Christmas tree that flashes on and off as "Jingle Bells" plays, for we always play a little game, a sort of singing version of musical chairs. When he pulls the tab out to start the music, I sing along to the first verse of "Jingle Bells." When he pushes the tab in to stop the music, I stop singing. We play back and forth, starting and stopping, for several rounds. Because the song is cued to always start at the beginning, I rarely make it past "Dashing through the snow." Only if he is distracted do I make it to "Jingle bells." We enjoy our little game immensely. Marshall enjoys controlling how Granma responds. I enjoy sitting before a book with my grandson, my first step in teaching him to read.

The retrieved book is very wet. Two days in the snow will do that. I am sad. Very sad. I love Jingle Bugs. So much so that I replaced my original copy of it, the one I used to read to my own children, after a rather unfortunate mishap three years ago. On that fateful day, Adella, who was two, had pulled out the music tab on the final page so far that I could not push it back in, creating a "Jingle Bell" hell. It was truly "The Song that Never Ends." I tried and tried to push and pull that worn tab to stop the music. All to no avail. 

Then when I could not silence the book, I tried muffling its sound, certain its battery would soon die. I put the book between the cushions of my couch and under several pillows on my bed. I even hid it in the garage. But I could not escape the noise. Oh, the noise! So I confess that I, an avowed book lover, then committed bibliocide, ripping and stabbing the book, crushing its very innards until it was silenced.

After a day of drying, Jingle Bugs 2.0 is very fragile. We sit down to read it. Marshall unintentionally pulls off the wings of the Snowbug, and we cannot unstick the tab that moves the Jingle Bugs on the mistletoe. But the battery is still strong. Perhaps too strong. The snow has not short-circuited it. The book still plays "Jingle Bells" and its star still brightly flashes. As we play our game, Marshall pulling the tab and me singing, I begin to worry. How long will this tab, weakened by two days in the elements, last. Will Marshall repeat history and launch Jingle Bugs 2.0 in an endless round of its theme song?

I carefully weigh my options. I can distract Marshall and then hide the book. But, I think, what's a grandmother for if not to teach her grandchild to appreciate books. Or we can read the book until it breaks. But such a step risks my very sanity. 

Or I can simply order Jingle Bugs 3.0. And so I shall. True Christmas classics never die. Thanks to batteries and Amazon.