I cut my eye, it got infected and I spent those joyous crucial final shopping days looking like crab with a broccoli floret stuck on one stalk-eye.
the water main from the house is “rooted” up so “waste water” (we’re being PC here) is gooshing out of the drain pipe for the washing machine. Too bad the cellar floor is brick, w/ no floor drain.
my alcholic, hyper-critical Ex isn’t here!
So I’ve been half blind, there’s depressing stuff on the cellar floor (hey, Satan bet you’re sorry you’re missing this one!) and…
I’ve never been happier.
Considering that things are a total mess, I’m lunatic happy. A wet, gentle snow put a quiet mantle outside. The dog’s snoozing, my friends piled over with gag/wonderful gifts, we took a huge roast over to the shelter and the ornaments look fine on the fig tree.
It’s been one hell of a rotten year, but I’m visiting Chris in a few weeks (blizzards permitting) and the people here have given me untold hours of laughter, thought and companionship. I know people I’ve never even met!
Oh, I’m gonna take so much shit for this after the Christmas sucks thread but, overall, yeah, this has been a GREAT holiday season for me.
I’m home alone (obviously, or I wouldn’t be here) but I just got off the phone with some of my family. I stopped playing a lot of their bullshit games and twisted my own attitude around and damn it ALL if things didn’t change!
My loser/boozer sister seems to have gotten her shit together. I spoke with her at length and she was sober, happy and hopeful for about the first time in 10 years! I spoke to her new beau and he is intelligent, witty and basically a great guy.
My other sister had a horrible cold but the baby (8 1/2 months along now) is fine and she is happy. Her husband sounds good and he is actually enjoying my other sisters company (this is a first).
My mother is STILL drinking but I have made my peace with this and have told her that I will no longer play rescuer to her victim. I have done the same with my father and a dear friend. These relationships were difficult to change or cut off but, in the end, I am better off and so are they.
I have also found, I am sure, the very love of my life. He is the most intelligent, thoughtful, romantic and all around most wonderful man I have ever met in my life.
So, yeah, this has been a VERY good year for me. Now, if I could only do something about that crack habit of mine!
Tonite I had the funniest, yet most wonderful thing happen. A few weeks ago some friends and I were talking about things we will always remember and I said that I will always remember my mom putting underwear in our Christmas stockings… right up until I was 35 years old.
My friend came by tonite with gifts for my son and me and after dinner she told me to look under the tree. She said she received a heaven sent email from my mom with special directions. Indeed there was a package from my mom direct from heaven. Inside were the traditional three pair of underwear.
I have lost much in the past couple of years and some I miss so very much and some I realize arent really worth missing after all.
Im sitting here with my undies and the little note that came with them, the email from heaven, shedding a tear and realizing that as much as I wanted to hate Christmas this year, I definitely have found the spirit through other people’s thoughtfulness.
Life is wonderful and the spirit is truly alive.
A true friend is one who walks in when the rest of the world walks out…there are Angels among us
You are so correct Veb, it IS the spirit that gets you thru all the bad circumstances in life. Not just at Christmas but the whole year thru. One thing I have learned in my many years on this earth, is that only you can make yourself happy… and how you look at what’s happening in your life sets the mood. Whenever life gets me down, I focus on what’s good… if I have a hard time finding the good… I go out and make it. I like having a full cup. Much more fun to clean up the mess when it spills… and messy can be fun!
I really try to be good but it just isn’t in my nature!
Well, I spent Christmas eve with some coworkers at a party. Most of them were from Ghana (sp?), and there was reggee music playing, and goat meat skewers served with rice and chicken and rice and pork.
It rocked, and in a way, it’s the kind of Christmas I needed this year.
I’m sitting here today, thinking of the friends I’ve made this last year, and the love I have, for them, and I guess I have that spirit after all.
Having someone I really care about has helped choke down those blues I get every holiday season.
Screw it. Being a cynic gets boring after awhile. Merry Christmas!
