A Story from Christmas Past...
Published: Mon, 12/25/23
I hope you're all having a very blessed and Merry Christmas. We had our Christmas Eve with my oldest son tonight (his wife was unfortunately under the weather so we sent home lots of gifts and goodies for her). We had a lot of fun and laughter.
My kids are the kind who truly know the real meaning behind this - family. When I was going through those stressful months of medical issues, and I started thinking about everything with Christmas coming up, and work and stuff, they said, "Let's not worry about the usual Christmas and just have a nice evening and meal together."
I ended up pulling through okay so I got them Christmas and felt up to it. They helped a lot with dinner and I loved seeing Scarlett realize that she's getting to a point where she can cook without an exact recipe or timer. She's learning family recipes instinctively.
I watched It's a Wonderful Life tonight - haven't watched that in awhile and Scarlett and I were talking about guardian angels (I loved Clarence's character) and Jesus and the true meaning of - not just Christmas, but the gift of our lives here.
Watching George Bailey on screen when he's distraught reminded me of a year when I was little - maybe 8-9 years old. My parents hadn't been divorced long and there was a mishap where my dad let some family friends stay in our house and they inadvertently threw away bags of receipts and important tax letters. The agents were coming down hard on him - I'd never seen him so depressed and stressed, and they didn't care what had happened.
My sister and I (she's about 6 years older than me) noticed Dad didn't have any Christmas decorations or gifts or anything. We weren't used to that, and we didn't care about getting anything - we just didn't like how sad it was around the house. So when he was out one day, we went up in the attic and got an old Christmas tree down that was about 3-4 feet tall.
We found some old newspapers and construction paper and we wrapped things around the house and put them under the tree. We had a pachinko machine that we wrapped, and we wrapped some golf clubs for him, toys from our room, etc.
We even made construction paper ornaments and hung them on the tree.
We just wanted him to be happy - to focus on everything good rather than his world falling apart.
When he came home, he walked in the front door, put his briefcase aside and sat down and turned on the TV, slumped in his chair looking like he was about to cry.
He hadn't noticed the tree or gifts.
Being a little kid, I chirped up and said, "Dad! Look what we made you!"
At that moment, he broke down and gathered us up in his big, strong dad arms and held us tight, kissing our heads and telling us how much he loved us.
He had a George Bailey moment. He realized what was important - and he cheered up (outwardly for us, I'm sure - but it got him through the worst moment).
Reminders of happy things are important. Sometimes we get bogged down in everything but that. I'm guilty of it, too.
I feel so grateful for my kids and my rescue puppies.
I loved the quote in It's a Wonderful Life: "Remember, no man is a failure who has friends."
I am very grateful and blessed to have you as a friend, even if you might live down under, by Nessie, in another state (or next door here in DFW)! My door is always open if you need a friend. I mean that figuratively, not literally LOL! Don't want anyone showing up on my porch. Ha ha! (I had one of those close encounters from a subscriber once). Seriously, though - if you need someone to talk to - to celebrate a win with or just vent to - you have a friend.
I pray you have a very Merry Christmas!
Much love from Texas,
~Tiff