I've got my Christmas cards mostly done, but a few stragglers to finish up. I'd like to write a Christmas letter one of these years, but can't think of anything to say. I always think of the potential audience and how can I poke fun at cousin A for the amusement of cousin B in a letter that goes to both of them. Not that I would poke fun at a relative behind their back. Not me.

We are trying to help my retarded cousin have a merry Christmas. This is her first year in her own apartment, having moved there from a group home in July, and she lives just down the street from us about 4 miles away, I found out this past summer.

She really is retarded, I'm not just saying that, as some might refer to a son or daughter-in-law who they think doesn't act very smart. Various people try to tell me she must be autistic, that seems to be the du jour thing, but nope, there really are just plain retarded people.

Betsy is a couple of years older than me, and she is a ward of the state of Nevada. Social services people supervise her through frequent home visits and taking her grocery shopping, and she rides one of those short para-transport buses to work at a sheltered workshop, to knitting at a knitting store, to bowling at the Gold Coast casino, and to church. She is more active than I am and knows the streets around here better than I do.

I decided our role in her life is to be a friend and invite her to do something with us for holidays and loan/give her Christmas decorations and go to knitting with her once in awhile. I don't want to become a big deal in her daily life, because I don't want to get in the way of what the staff members who help her are doing and telling her to do.

I'm in touch with Betsy's sister in Illinois, and right now we are trying to coordinate buying some furniture for Betsy's apartment. The family's fear is that they will invest in furniture on her behalf, then this living alone thing won't work out, and she'll go back into the group home and the furniture will disappear into the system. They don't begrudge her the furniture, but it's happened before and they wish she at least still had the card table they bought for her years ago.

We'll have Betsy over for Christmas Day dinner and a movie and knitting and opening gifts. It will be a nice change from our usual Christmas, which is reading library books and maybe making a batch of soft pretzels, just the two of us. I told Mr. Troutbend that we need to wrap up some things we already have to give to each other so when Betsy opens her gifts from us we can open some from each other and it will seem like more of a family thing. He says we'll pretend we opened ours Christmas Eve.