I was having trouble breathing. I was trying to . . . catch up. Here it was, the single most important announcement to hit our family since, well, forever, and he forgot to tell me?
"Well, when did you find out?" I asked him.
"I think it was last week sometime," he said, calmly smearing butter on his potatoes. We were having a late dinner. The kids were already in bed. He chose this as the moment to fork over the news: When he was dropping our daughter Anna at kindergarten one day, her teacher informed him that Anna had been selected to play Mary in the Christmas pageant.
"Mary! " I said. "Does Anna know this?"
"Well, she was standing right there when the teacher told me," he said.
And she didn't tell me, either? "What is the matter with you people? " I said.
"Us?" he said.
I was hyperventilating. Mary! Spasms of joy were engulfing my heart. I was being transported to an exalted state -- the Mother of Mary! -- while Mr. Mashed Potatoes over there was staring blankly. "Honey -- Mary?"
"Yeah?" he said.
I reached inward and found something resembling forgiveness. "You didn't grow up in Christmas-pageant culture," I said, referring to the fact that he is Jewish. "You don't understand how big this is."
"Mary," he said, "was Jewish."
Oh, this was no time for smarty-pants talk. "Our daughter is going to be the star of the show!" I said.
"I thought Jesus was the star," he said.
I reiterated my smarty-pants line. I asked him to please help me figure out just how it was they chose our child for this role. Her beauty? Intelligence? Some obvious grace?
