My Christmas To-Do List

My mind swirls with what needs to be done:

• Baking
• Candy-making
• Making homemade gifts
• Wrapping gifts
• Shopping for gifts

I'm sure there's more -- I just can't remember it all right now.

So where's the wonder in the midst of the busyness?  Does the sometimes happy, sometimes stressful bustling busyness of Christmas automatically negate the wonder?  Where's the balance?

It's in the Advent moments like these:

• the lighting of the advent candles

• the joyful singing of an overly excited preschooler

• the full table of bowed heads thanking God for blessings

• the air of anticipation that hovers over everything mirroring the waiting experienced by the people of Israel so many years ago, wondering, waiting, expecting even as they went about their daily business

And in those moments my heart ponders the meaning and my spirit sings, 

Come, thou long expected Jesus, 

born to set thy people free; 

 from our fears and sins release us, 
                         let us find our rest in thee.  

 hope of all the earth thou art; 
                         Israel's strength and consolation, 
                          dear desire of every nation, 

 joy of every longing heart.

Our Out-of-the-Box Thanksgivings

Thanksgiving has always been an eclectic sort of holiday for me.  Living so far from extended family, my parents looked for alternative ways to make Thanksgiving meaningful - even if we as kids didn't always appreciate their intentions.

My Thanksgiving memories from yesteryear include:

•  faux Indian name tags (like Babbling Brook) at our place settings;
•  inviting over the people from church who had no place else to go either (like the mentally challenged woman who had no concept of personal space that we as kids groaned about inviting over);
• plastic tablecloths with magic-marker "I'm thankful for..." statements by each of us, carried over from year to year, a source of ribbing among us siblings as the names of the boyfriends written in indelible ink changed with the calendar year.

Fast-forward to my adult married Thanksgivings ~ Now both of our extended families live far away, so Thanksgiving is still on our own.  So the tradition, begun in my childhood, carries over, but with our own unique twists.  I admit, I'm not so handy or creative with the "fun" name tags, but we find our Thanksgivings to be a new adventure from year-to-year.

• One year, soon after we were married, we had a "very Jamaican Thanksgiving" with our close friends, cooking traditional American food alongside authentic Jamaican cuisine. 
• Another year, Thanksgiving consisted of a dozen or so international students from my ESL class clustered around our coffee table in our living room, enjoying their first-ever dinner in a real-life American home. 
• Last year, we had two Thanksgivings -- to fit in different schedules for different friends.  
• This year we enjoyed having our "adopted" college kids home with us for the week, cutting down a real tree (first time for them), and cooking turkey in a whole new way.  

So this Thanksgiving, I'm thankful for the legacy my parents provided -- for the example of looking beyond ourselves.  And now we're pretty excited about our tradition of non-traditional Thanksgivings.  I can't wait to see where the next Thanksgivings will take us and who will grace our table next!

Twas the Snow Day before Thanksgiving....

Twas the snow day before Thanksgiving, and all through the house, not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse....

Except for a certain little four-year-old girl, who sprang through the house,
Crying, "It's snowing, it's snowing!" with utter delight.

She sprang to the window, exclaiming with joy,
bouncing up and down like a wind-up toy.

As quickly as she could rouse her dad and her mom,
she had them scurrying to dress her up nice and warm.

Donned with boots, gloves, coat, hat,
she fearlessly braves the cold and the wet.

Within minutes returning to bang on the glass,
with a rallying cry to join her repast!

So Mom and Dad bundled up, too,
building a snowman and admiring the view,

Of snowflakes wending their way from the skies
and a happy little girl with sparkling dark eyes.

Perspective

Perspective doesn't mean absence of pain.

                                    Perspective doesn't even mean peace.

Perspective adds some sense to what would otherwise be senseless.

It lends a small tinge of sanity in an otherwise insane experience.

I think we expect too much of perspective.

We put too much faith in its power.

Yet we need it as a barrier against dropping into the abyss of grief, loss, pain, and heartache.

We need to know that there's a bigger plan.  So perspective gives us this.  

But that's all it can give -- knowledge, awareness, recognition.  

Not solace, not comfort, not assuaging of suffering.

The rational mind seeks perspective, while the heart turns away, knowing that what it seeks can't be found there.  

Today My Smile is Forced

so you're pregnant again.  glowing with happiness and expectation.  

congratulations flood you, surround you, then it's my turn to smile, to congratulate. 

And I do. 

I believe in babies.  I am pro-family.  

But sometimes it hurts to smile.  

Sometimes the congratulations feel forced. 

I don't want to feel that way. I want to feel nothing but pure, unadulterated joy for you.

But the lump in my throat is real.  

The pain that comes with experiencing my own emptiness again and again won't be ignored.

Depending on the day your news catches me, smiling may come more easily. 

 I may laugh, and exude more genuine joy. 

But then there are the days when I'm struggling.  

when the grief I thought I was done with is breaking me again.  

of course when you share your news, you can't possibly know that  I'm having one of those days. 

But I am.  

And today, my smile is forced.

Jacie-isms

Another Jacie post.  We've been having the most incredible conversations lately!  I love her analytical little mind.

Highlights:

Recently, she's been telling me emphatically, "Everyone has birthdays, even adults, until they're old enough to go heaven!"  (I like that perspective!)

This morning she complained that she didn't want to go to school because all of her friends are sinners. (Of course, I took the opportunity to explain that we are all sinners, but God wants us show love to each other even as He showed love to use "while we were yet sinners.")

She informed the cashiers at Walmart that she's gonna get a job there when she's 16, though at a later time when I asked her where she wanted work, she told me Target "because they have empty cash register lanes, so there's enough room for me to work there."

Her main goals in life are to drive a car and have a baby -- She told me that what would be the best "job." And that she's going to live in a house that we give her when she's grown up.

And, just when I think I can't be astonished anymore, I discover upon picking her up from AWANA that her paper is the one not colored, but with the word search done!

I love that I get to parent this little girl!

Still

Definitely not original with me, the words of this old poem by Harriet Beecher Stowe popped into my mind this morning during my meditation time:

Still, still with thee, when purple morning breaketh,
When the bird waketh and the shadows flee;
Fairer than morning, lovelier than the daylight,
Dawns the sweet consciousness, I am with thee!

Alone with thee, amid the mystic shadows,
The solemn hush of nature newly born;
Alone with thee in breathless adoration,
In the calm dew and freshness of the morn.
As in the dawning o'er the waveless ocean
The image of the morning star doth rest,
So in this stillness thou beholdest onlyThine image in the waters of my breast.

Still, still with thee! as to each new-born morning
A fresh and solemn splendor still is given,
So doth this blessed consciousness, awaking,
Breathe, each day, nearness unto thee and heaven.
When sinks the soul, subdued by toil, to slumber,
Its closing eye looks up to thee in prayer,
Sweet the repose beneath thy wings o'ershading,
But sweeter still to wake and find thee there.
So shall it be at last, in that bright morning
When the soul waketh and life's shadows flee;
O, in that hour, fairer than daylight dawning,
Shall rise the glorious thought, I am with thee!