“It’s 7 a.m., you said I could open a present,” Bryson said. And so I did. Christmas had started.

He opened his stocking and, with Hannah, Ryan and Paula soon joining us, the presents, and the time, flew by. Books, gift cards, clothes. Sometimes even a few thank-yous. Until there was not a gift left under the tree.

I’d asked Bryson this year is he would want a big, rather expensive present, and only get a few more things in addition; or would he rather get the customary number and forego something truly special. I knew what his answer would be the moment I asked.

“Did you get everything you wanted?” I asked, knowing the gift at the top of his list was not to be found.

“Pretty much,” he said. “Well, except for the Havoc Heli, but that’s OK.”

He spoke of a small indoor remote control helicopter he’d been wanting for months.

“So was my big present one of these?” he said, looking at the small pile of books and video games surrounding him.

“Well, I’m not sure, I hope your Christmas isn’t in ruins,” I said.

“What? No.”

“Because that would be a shame if your Christmas were in ruins. Or should I say if your Christmas were in the ruins.”

“What are you saying?”

“I said it wouldn’t be nice if your Christmas were in … the … ruins.”

Bryson stood and looked around, knowing a clue when he heard it. He just had no clue what the clue was supposed to mean.

“Should we play the hot-cold game?” I said. It was the clue of the last resort. “Because right now” – as he looked through the wreckage of wrapping paper on the floor – “you’re cold.”

Within a minute he was standing next to the bookcase near the Christmas tree, his hand darting out to The Ruins, from the top of which protruded a white envelope. He pulled the envelope from the book, opened it and began to read.

Hi Bryson, remember us, it’s the elves and we’re back.

2007 was such a great year and that’s a fact, Jack.

You’re getting so old, next year you’ll be teening,

Though your dad says you’re already primping and preening.

But enough of this small talk, you know the drill.

We give the clues and you follow them still.

Of course now that you are so much more older,

These clues will be so much more bolder.

You’ll look to your dad when you must confess

That you need help, but he will be clueless.

This time, Bryson, the hunt is on you,

And the fact is, if you don’t rather than do

Find the present that we have hidden so true

The lights outside won’t be the only thing blue.

Because this is the search to end all the searches.

And should you fail, your IQ it besmirches.

This is a present worth much diligence,

For it cost so many dollars and cents.

Thus for you we are surely not making it easy,

Our clues will be tough and our clues will be tease-y.

What do you say, is it time to get started?
Is your attitude one that is fun and good-hearted?

Because you need to go to the place where you find,

A stick you use to find joy all of the time.

“A stick?” Bryson said. “What kind of stick?”

“I have no idea,” I said. “Ask the elves.”

Each year since Bryson was 3, the North Pole elves visited our home and sprinkled rhyming clues around the house, leading him to his big present. One year it was a bike, another time a scooter, once a giant-sized Lego set. Even when his belief in elves dropped to an all-time low when he was 9, he asked that they still visit. I imagine they’ll come to our house as long as he is here.

“Read the clue one more time,” I said.

“A stick you use to find joy all the time.”

“The answer is right there.”

An idea popped into Ryan’s mind and, because he is 10, an age where thinking things through doesn’t apply, he blurted, “Your bike!”

And Bryson, being 12 and not having a clue, bought it.

The two of them traipsed into the very-cold garage. Bryson looked at his bike. His scooter. He picked up and examined his Air Soft rifle.

“This is a stick that gives me joy,” he said. No argument from me.”

“It’s not in here,” I said, rubbing my hands together. “Think of two words in that clue. Look at it again.”

“Stick?” Bryson said, back in the family room.

“Yes.”

“And, uh, find? Stick find? Find the stick?”

“No.”

“Joy? Stick joy.”

“Close. Turn them around.”

“Joy stick?”

“Bingo.”

Bryson headed to the Xbox 360 cabinet and, after a little more guidance, found the next clue hidden in the battery compartment of the controller. He unfurled the scrap of paper and read.

You found it, that’s great, did you need some assistance?

Now outside you must seek where warm air sometimes vents.

(Apparently elves knew a short clue was needed given lack of space inside the joystick. Clever, those elves. )

Bryson threw open the back door, stepped into the pair of tired old sneakers kept on the patio for such occasions, and was on the hunt.

“I know where this is,” he said, heading toward the AC unit on the side of the house. “Too easy.”

He looked around the mechanical box but found nothing. I explained to him the basic working of the AZ unit, that it blows air into the house. “You need to find something that vents to the outside. What blows air from inside?”

“I don’t know. Seriously, I have no idea.”

From a know-it-all to a know-nothing-at-all in a matter of seconds. Such was the nature of these yearly hunts.

Bryson would have no clue about the vent. He’d never done laundry in his life. As far as he was concerned, he put dirty clothes in the magic plastic bin and in a few days or so, those clothes would return to his bed, fresh and clean.

We resorted to the hot-cold game. A few minutes later he was pulling a clue taped carefully to caked-up lint on the lip of the dryer vent.

We’re a little surprised that you were so able,

To find a clue that wasn’t just out on a table.

To get the next one you just might need permission

From two roommates who are probably hopin’ and wishin’

While you’re at their favorite spot doing some fishin’

You’ll do the one thing that will make them quit their bitchin’.

He read it once. Twice. Again. And again. Pausing each time, for emphasis, before the word “bitchin.’”

Stationery: 5 cents. Printer ink: 12 cents. Having an elf-written poem giving you license to say “bitchin’”: priceless.

“Can we just get on with it,” I said.

Bryson went back into the house and, getting past “bitchin’” enough to think about the clue, puzzled over it.

“Two roommates? Roommates … do dogs count?”

“Of course.”

Bryson headed into the laundry room and carefully inspected the bag of dog food, looking inside and out. Right idea, wrong location. After finding nothing, he looked at Dusty’s food dish. Then water dish. Nothing.

“What about where Sandy eats?” I said.

“That’s where I was going next.” He picked up her metal bowl and removed the clue taped there.

You found it, that’s fine, but we’re so not done yet,

With Sandy (claws) eyeing you, that we will bet.

You know how your dad says you must do your chores,

(Hard work in the future will open all doors.)

Your next clue has nothing to do much with that.

It’s more of a pun and it may leave you flat.

Read closely these words to learn of your fate,

And you will be trained to pull your own freight.

“Do you know what a pun is?” I said.

“Not really.”

What the heck are they teaching these kids in school? “It’s a play on words. Read the last sentence again.”

He did. “Oh, oh. I so have this.”

Bryson walked to the electric-train layout in the family room and kneeled down. He peered at the cars, eventually opening the doors to the boxcar where he extracted a piece of paper. “That was way too easy.”

We wondered if you could have figured it out,

As here at the Pole we sure have our doubts.

Did you sit there and wonder or perhaps even pout?

Our puzzle skills are mad which we like to tout.

But now let’s continue upon our Christmas way,

To a gift that surely will make your best day.

(Though that day will not come for many more weeks

thus the gift of patience will make waiting less bleak).

A character you are, we know that it’s true.

And in your fine house is a character of you.

Find what we mean and look on the back.

You’ll find one more clue to put you on track.

“A character of me, like a photo?” Bryson said. “I think I know this one.”

He headed into the computer room and picked up the photo he himself with Pluto, Disney’s vocally challenged dog (in Disney’s world, everything can talk, from chipmunks to ducks. So what the hell is wrong with Pluto. Even his genetic brother Goofy, who clearly is not as intelligent, can talk. Was it an accident? A birth defect?)

Bryson looked to the back of the frame. Nothing.

“I think the clue was a character of you, not you with a character,” I said.

Bryson sat on the couch where the answer was just a few feet away. “Look around,” I said.

As soon as his eyes found the painting, in which he was drawn by a colleague of mine, they lit up. He took the drawing off the wall and removed the clue from the back.

You found the next clue, that is great but not all,

(first please put the picture back up on the wall).

We talked once before about you and your work,

(and while doing it you may think your dad is a jerk).

But a chore you do weekly will lead to a clue,

A chore that done weekly has you seeing blue.

For some reason, Bryson spent the longest time figuring this one out. Not because he has all that many chores. (“I pick up dog poop, but that doesn’t have blue. I vacuum. Mop. Clean my room.” “Is that stuff you do every week?” “No.” “I wish you did them weekly.”)

Back to hot-cold. As the hints led him outside, it finally occurred to him. He raced to the side of the house and threw open the lid of the very blue recycling barrel, the same barrel that every week he took to the curb, The clue was taped to the inside of the lid.

We knew that you’d do it, you would find your own way,

We hope you dressed warmly on such a cold day.

Your present by now we’re sure that you’ve earned,

It’s time that its spot is something you’ve learned.

When you were small, much smaller than now,

(seems so long ago, time flies by and how)

You’d hide from your dad and the dog and us all

You’d hide in a place where you’d duck and you’d crawl.

If you remember that spot, that one and the same.

Go there and end our fun Christmas game.

For the next few minutes, Bryson visited his favorite hiding spaces in a time he was small enough to fit in tiny spaces. Under his bed. Under my bed. The back of his closet. The back of my closet.

And, finally, behind the couch in the computer room, where a package wrapped in a silvery paper dotted with candy canes waited.

He ripped it open to find his Havoc Heli, in all of it’s $29.99 glory.

“Cool, thanks,” he said.

“You are very welcome. Merry Christmas,” I said.

“Yeah, merry Christmas.”

His disappointment was obvious. Was this the big present I had hinted about for months? The one I would not even hint about, though he often would ask if it was bigger than this or more expensive than that.

A stupid Havoc Heli? What’s the big freakin’ deal?

I changed plans slightly. I was going to let him discover it on his own, but a little alteration was necessary.

“Why don’t you just go ahead and play with the Havoc Heli?” I said.

Bryson noticed a certain tone in my voice, as well as the anticipation in my eyes.

“Open it?” he said.

“Sure. That’s up to you.”

The excitement returned. He pulled the Havoc Heli from the box, as well as an envelope. Inside was the elves’ final poem.

We hope that this toy does not disappoint,

We hope that you’re not just a bit out of joint.

Is this the big present your dad said he’d got,

The present he said had cost quite a lot?

Well, we’ll tell you this and know that it’s so

For the answer to that is a yes and a no.

Your prize really isn’t this small Havoc-heli

Though it’s nice and you’ll like it just find and just well-y

But your present does involve a whirling helicopter.

But one much bigger than this little chopper.

Far out in the desert and a few months away,

You and your dad will have the best of best days.

For on March 1, and this is the topper,

You’ll ride for an hour on a big helicopter.

You’ll fly over ghost towns and fly over mines,

And enjoy an adventure of a lifetime.

We hope that this meets all expectations

We expect that we’ll get your adulation.

Merry Christmas young Bryson, we hope that you’ve had,

A wonderful time with Santa (your dad).