Hey Merry Christmas

I love love Christmas. Its got its own spirit and its own way of making people smile at you and talk to you and be nicer than at other times. The real meaning sure gets lost sometimes in the busy shopping days but you know its never far from your thoughts. There are miracles and things that happen for no reason or for some reason. Some doors get closed on your life while others get opened so you can go forward in another direction. I miss so much the people who are not with us anymore. My mom, my Dad, my Aunts and Uncles and husbands. We use to have a full house and tummys when we would go to my Aunts and before that my Moms. My little family is small now and I am so thankful for them and for the way they make me feel special at Christmas and all the time. When I worked for myself in my business I could hardly make time for anything. The week ends I worked so employees could be off, early mornings and late hours were normal and i got to where i hated the Christmas season. People were irritable, mean and demanding and the hours so long i use to fall exausted in sleep on the sofa as soon as I got home. I would rush to get to my Aunts on Christmas Eve, all loaded up with gifts for everyone and excited to finally be out of the store and able to see her and my son and his family. It made all the hard work worthwhile because i was able to buy them the presents and gifts that I really wanted them to have. We would have a big evening dinner, open the gifts because they would have to leave for Santa the next morning.

Then, my aunt and i would consume some wine and fall asleep , sometimes both of us would sneak pesents under the tree for each other we had hidden till Christmas morning. She was 84 and still thought of me as her "baby". I hated to leave early that day, but the awful day afterChristmas at the busines...the exchange day...would dawn early...there were no normal holidays in retail. All it did was drain you and leave you nothing more to give.

The holidays were another day to be open so other people could shop. Many a time we celebrated the 4 th of July at the store with "take out" bar b que. from 1976 to 2003 ...my time was not mine. It was so wonderful to retire and be involved with the holidays with family, neighbors and other friends....watch football, celebrate Thanksgiving and Christmas and the 4th and Easter with each other..finally, a time to just be. I still miss the ones not here..so badly sometimes I wish I could re-create the past. But we can't and this day is the one to be thankful for and Celebrate the miracles, even the little ones that Christmas and all its meanings bring.

Thanks to my little family for letting me have the time with them that they do because i do know what "have so little time" means. Thanks to my neighbors for taking care of me too and for letting me be part of their lives and mostly for letting me love everyone and share the joys and the small miracles that happen each day.