Gosh, so much has happened this past year. Where to begin?
Sadly, 2007 was a year of endings for me. I had to put my beloved cat Spook to sleep in February. I gave her eighteen faithful years of servitude. I miss having to figure out which food she will deign to eat each day and how to get out of bed without disturbing her when I have to pee the middle of the night. Her passing was the end of an era, really. All the kitties who “knew me when” are now gone. I do have two new kitties, of course. Life, after all, is a series of pets.
Sadder still, my Aunt Flora died in June. She was the glue that kept my mother’s side of the family together. After Grandma died, we would all congregate at Flora’s for the holidays. Flora was adamant it was NOT HER JOB to be the new family gathering place and people had BETTER NOT show up there. So of course we all did, faithfully, every holiday. She was a funny, kooky old broad and I miss her terribly.
The year was not all about endings, though. The company I work for moved into a brand new office building at the beginning of the year. Fresh paint! New office furniture! A kitchen with a dishwasher and a TV! Admittedly, there have been a few glitches, such as a temperature modulation problem and Niagara Falls outside the back door when it rains, not to mention a bathroom light that turns off on you mid-pee. (The elderly clients especially love stumbling around in the dark trying to find their way out of the bathroom. Whew! You should hear the potty mouths on some of them.) But working in the newest part of town and not having homeless people camping out in the parking lot more than makes up for a few pesky annoyances.
The Big Exciting Thing for the year happened in August when I bought a house in the same small town where I work. How novel it is to no longer have a commute. I have two whole extra hours every day just to do stuff. Speaking of which, did you know homeownership comes with a whole new set of stressors and responsibilities one cannot even dream of as a renter? You did? Oh. Well, regardless of the added ick, I admit it has simplified my life in many ways. My commute to work is so short I can run errands AND go home for lunch yet still make it back to the office in one hour. I am minutes away from my elderly mother so can now accompany her to doctor appointments or pop over to change her light bulbs. But the best part of having my own place is turning my former outdoor cats into indoor cats. No more worrying about what might happen to them out in the big bad world where cars and dogs and the animal police roam.
To date in my new place, I have hosted an informal pumpkin carving party as well as my first ever totally-prepared-by-me Thanksgiving dinner. The pumpkins were messy and labor-intensive but turned out fabulous. As for Thanksgiving, nobody got food poisoning so I consider it a resounding success.
I am not happy about the way each year seems to bring more endings into my life but it does make me more appreciative of what I have and who I have to share it with. That cat will not always be there. Neither will that person. I am going to go hug something now. It will probably be something furry. Please feel free to go hug something now, too.
Merry Christmas.
_____________________________________
I did not send this letter out with my Christmas cards this year. It did not feel quite...mmm, cheery...enough.
And by "Christmas" I mean "Paganish winter festival to celebrate the solstice that has transformed into a month long gift-giving, tree-trimming, party-throwing extravaganza followed by a drunken bash to celebrate the new calendar year."
Happy holidays my friends.
Tags: christmas 2007, holiday letter
Ignorant and Hardhearted
I have many happy holiday season thoughts these days.
This is not one of them.
As I watched Good Morning America this morning during my morning makeup and hair ritual, something guest Kay Warren said caught my attention. Kay is married to Rick Warren, a pastor who wrote the book "The Purpose Driven Life." At least I think he wrote it. There was some talk about how it was really her, or it was her idea so the credit should go to her...whatever.
What caught my attention was how she described her thoughts on AIDS before her great epiphany:
The comment itself is not surprising. She is a popular Christian minister's wife who admits she was jealous of her husband's success and thought becoming an AIDS activist would help her image. (That is not editorial commentary, by the way. She said it herself.) No, what I found interesting is there was no mention the gay community after that quote. It was suddenly all about The Children and The Poor and how she must help them, and you must too!
I so wish the interviewer, Robin Roberts, had asked what Kay is doing for gay people with AIDS now that she is no longer ignorant and hardhearted. But she didn't. ::sigh::
She did ask Rick Warren for his thoughts on Sunday's Colorado Church Shootings. He stumbled around saying a whole lot of nothing for a bit until he found his way back to the tried and true, "It all comes back to The Lord" and how if the gunman had just had faith, this would never have happened.
Because Christians never kill people? I sometimes have a hard time following the logic.
Source
Tags: a purpose driven life, AIDS, kay warren, rick warren, colorado church shootings
Posted at 08:52 AM in Social Commentary | Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBack (0)
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