I found out my kids weren’t invited to Christmas through a text that didn’t even mention their names. Just a quick message from my mom two weeks before the 25th: “Hey, sweetie. We’re doing something smaller this year.Just immediate family. Hope that’s okay.”I stared at it for a long time, the phone heavy in my hand, the tiny bubbles of a new notification refusing to appear. The kitchen smelled like cinnamon and burnt toast.

Outside, someone’s inflatable snowman bowed and straightened in the wind like it was apologizing for everyone. Not sure what she meant by immediate family, considering I am her daughter, I texted back asking who would be there. After a few hours, she finally replied, “Just Ryan and Melanie and the kids.It’s easier that way. You know how crowded it gets.”Ryan is my brother. Older by two years, golden boy since birth.The kind of person who gets away with parking across two spaces and somehow makes the security guard laugh about it. Three kids, noisy as hell, but somehow they never cause chaos.

Just energy.Mine are a little quieter, a little more sensitive, and somehow always the ones being too much. We’ve all done Christmas at my parents’ house every year since before Ila, my oldest, was born. Eleven years of piling into their overdecorated living room, watching my dad fall asleep during Elf, eating my mom’s overcooked ham, and pretending it was great.

The glass ornaments, the angel with a crooked halo, the same ceramic nativity with a donkey missing an ear. A whole tradition balanced on habit and denial. But this year, my kids, Ila and Mike, weren’t included because there wasn’t room.