Whoops and hollers abounded this Christmas when the kids opened a Wii they didn’t even know they wanted. Inwardly, Chase and I were whooping too. We are not forerunners on the technology front. We live simply in this way, without satellite or cable, with movies we borrow from the library or rent for $1. It was a decision we made in protest to all the family time that was being robbed by Wipeout and American Idol. Still, we open the lid of our Toshiba when we want a Parenthood fix but the Wii, let’s just say it was a big hit.

My son is a Mario extraordinaire. A fanatic.

My daughter, the little one, she holds the remote and shouts like she’s part of something big. She is.

My other daughter, the oldest, she tries. Oh how she tries.

It is such great entertainment when they play together. My older daughter will often die on her first jump, a single slide, an erratic I’m- just- going- with- full- force attitude. It’s hilarious. But even funnier is the way she’s perfected “Button A.” The button that puts you in a bubble. Milliseconds from a painful death in rolling lava and she bubbles herself. Midair and heading for the enemy, she floats. It’s genius, really. Until her brother dies. Until he has to be in a bubble too. Because then the game is over.

I feel like I’m in a bubble right now. A writing bubble. I might come out for a snack or to ensure that no is strangling anyone else. I do what I have to, and not much more because I’m dangling above everything in my own space. While the kids jump and run and fight enemies below me, I am hovering with 26 letters and a passion.
In this space, my characters are like real people, the intersecting story of their lives, a part of me. I know them. I like them. And I think you will too.