It was Nice
Send light and prayers to my Uncle Wilbur who is having a stent put into his heart sometime today. Funny, even though he’s in his 90s, he’s feeling a little scared. Although, he did really like seeing his nephews jump around his room last night. Have you ever noticed how much elderly people look like babies? The way they have all the light and glow around them — their eyes twinkle all the time? When I was little, and my Mom would tell me to pray for someone who was sick, I would always pray that they would get better. Now, I pray that they will feel safe and protected no matter what happens. I wonder if that’s because I think they will be fine no matter what happens?
It was Nice
The boxes with the Christmas ornaments was opened tonight. I put it off as long as I could — but it had to be done. Opening the boxes sends some kind of magic genie out — my kids have the ornaments out of the box and onto the tree before I have even finished looking inside. It’s the same way every year, no matter how slowly I open the box. There were some casualties this year in terms of broken glass.
Bubble wrap is everywhere, crumpled newspaper is everywhere, broken pine needles from last year’s Christmas tree are strewn all over the floor, and they’re fighting over the placement of every single ornament on the tree. And the tree looks — let’s just say — it needs a lot of fine tuning.
I wanted to rush them to bed so I can have some peace again. I couldn’t give a hoot about that Christmas story I was going to read them every night. I could care less about our Nutcracker Advent calendar that has a portion of the story to read each night. I wanted them to go away so I could pick up my house and have some peace and quiet. But I stopped myself. If not tonight, then when?
I pulled them all onto the living room sofa (they were still bickering), coaxed my oldest one downstairs, with his violin, and turned off the lights so I couldn’t see the mess and just looked at the tree. No, of course they weren’t quiet. But the tree looked pretty good with the lights off. My oldest played some songs for us. We’ve never sat and listened to him before. He was so proud that we were listening, and it really seemed to quiet everyone down. Then I read the daily Nutcracker selection and hung the advent book ornament on the tree, and then we read part of our Christmas story.
I think as Mothers we tend to turn ourselves unconsciously into one of the “workers.” Like the bellhops and maid at a fancy hotel. The children become our “guests” and we work behind the scenes to see that everything gets done. We could, and sometimes do, ask for help, but it’s just easier to do all the work ourselves.
Tonight, I turned myself into one of the guests. I ignored the mess and just enjoyed the moment with them. It really isn’t that hard to do.
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