well, for some reason Christmas for the last few years has been more hassle than its worth. maybe it stems from the build up of marital tension, having to spend time with my in-laws who think I'm an idiot whom makes bad decisions (but that is a whole other topic). and to top it off last year my Dad was deathly Ill (lung cancer..he passed away Jan 2nd). but you know what! i was inspired damn it!!!! By a few things and people. 1. i see how giddy Rev gets when he puts up his lights and decorations and it warms my heart! 2. I listen to Glen Beck(i know some of you cringe at the name) and was thinking about a story he told about his best christmas ever. he said it was the one where they had nothing....it brings the true meaning of the season to light. he is right. focus on the real reason (if your a Christian its Christ) family, friends and relationships. and it will be happy. 3. i am not gonna let the world or the state of it get me down! I make my own happiness! I am no longer gonna let other peoples actions get me down. if you want to be miserable on Christmas...go ahead...Im not gonna be miserable with you...been there, done that! 4. if things go horribly awry and plans don't go as planned...just laugh about it! its too much work to be frustrated! its noon. i think im gonna go get a shower ...light my pipe (i do smoke one on occasion!) and sweep the snow off my walks. i think some hot coco is in my future! Merry Christmas to Yinz an Yerz !
This is the first year of my life that my brothers and I won't be getting together. It always was our way for each of their families to celebrate on Christmas Day and then we'd all get together a day or two after. Even after Mom and Dad passed away, we continued the tradition. We all knew it was going to have to stop some day as we're just getting too large, but it's sad to think the day has finally come. I have 3 brothers, two of whom have 4 kids, 10 grandkids with two more on the way and one brother with 3; (he had 5, but we lost two of them in a terrible house fire back in '07). That's a total of 46!! I guess the only way to do it anymore is to rent a hall!!
Good thread idea A! Snoot - so what if there's 50 people - do an open house theme with folks bringing pot luck sample dishes, and keep the family thing going if you can. My family had huge gatherings, then members started to pass, others moved too far away to make the trip back (like my wife and I), and now it is just my wife and I at Christmas. Same thing with her family. Kinda sad, but we love the season and we make it special anyway. I find Christmas is the time when everyone seems to be changed, even if it is just a little bit. I love the music, it is gentle and family oriented, and I love the fact that people reach out to others they normally might not. The crispness of the air, the lights on trees and houses, the excitement of the kids in the neighborhood, it all comes together. As for gifts, we gave up doing that years ago too although I find my Airstream, my Safari, my Chevelle, and my pet, somehow all manage to buy ME a wonderful just what I wanted gift . I'm always just so amazed at how good they are at knowing just what they/umm, I mean I, was hoping to find for them. Life is good. This is a time of the year when it doesn't matter what someone else thinks of me, I don't particularly care about that, what I do care about is that I like what I am and what I am doing and beyond that, they are entitled to their opinions, voiced or not. Merry Christmas to all and to all may the New Year be filled with all the things that continue to confirm for you that you are the best you can be.
Hey I got my Christmas present early. Me and the wife went and rented a house with the option to buy after a year with Owner Financing for 14 years. Life is great, marriage is on track like it should be, a new roof over our heads this week. Family is all together like it should be. So what we will not exchange presents ,but we are together and will have a big Christmas Dinner with King our GSD drooling for ham fat and bone. It will be one of our better Christmas in a few years. Our middle son is home for a year now from Iraq. So what more could we ask for? Not a Thing we already have it. Merry Christmas to all here.
My wife was frustrated this weekend, and took a couple pot-shots at me. We always make our own version of what a rum-soaked, fruit-overladed Christmas Cake is. We started the tradition in 1997, in Mexico. Couldn't fine mollases anywhere, but we found a recipe to make our own mollases with roasted cane sugar (really brown sugar) and rum, and some spices. Since there was a risk of fire (gas stove) with the rum, that was my job, and has been ever since. My dear wife starts saving peels from every citrus fruit you can think of, for the whole year, and freezes them. By October/November, she starts cutting them into strips, and candies them (boiled in a sugar solution). Tedious work, unless you're watching a good funny flick. Well now that we are in a country with Mollases, she said, how come I still only do the rum/mollases part? Fair enough. Pot-shot number 2, was much nastier and my answer deserves some detail. Her questions typically are "Why don't I answer her on many of her topics." Such as why do gangs kill each other off? Why are there so many rapes? Why is the world so f'd up?" Since I was 25, Graduate Engineer, Business Owner, success beyond my imagination, arrogant as all get out, and humbled by my own ignorance of WHO leadeth me to still waters..., until... I got to see all my successes turned to sh!t, I refused to ever let the WHYS of the ugly, enter my life. I realized that where I am, my ONLY DEFENSE needs a clean sandbox, unfettered with the SH!T that goes on. My wife kept prodding me to see if I was serious, but she also wondered why, since we live in one of the worst neighbourhoods in Canada, that WE aren't touched. Until Saturday morning, she never GOT IT. I said to her, as ugly, humble, simple as our home may be, it is our Temple, where we LIVE. We need to be talking about what we need to do to make it as we want it, to generate a feeling of home, of the rich substance that binds people, NOT the stuff that piques your curiosity. Not one more Noise-byte has been forthcoming. I honestly do not care to know or understand WHY people self-destruct, when mine and, their, only job is to construct the world we know we should have and live in. I'm only gonna live once, and die only once. Between those 2 events, I want to enjoy the trip, moment-by-moment. Sure am glad you started this thread so frankly and openly. Thanks.
Kudos on being a Glenn Beck fan! I used to hate Christmas, working in retail made it hell, nothing but Christmas shoppers and Christmas music for a month, yuck. I was really excited about Christmas this year, bought all kinds of decorations and a big 7 foot tree, even have a wreath on my truck. But beyond the truck, I haven't had the gusto to decorate, since Hannah left. It's made the holidays real hard. Merry Christmas All!
tom, i remember how it was when i was your age. getting very attatched to whomever i was dating. the problem was they didnt usually feel the way i did...they just said they did. i had a girl screw with my emotions for 5 years. i stayed with her through all kinds of mental issues she had Then, since she wanted to look like the victim, she and her psychotic mom told everyone that i went nuts, tried to force myself on her, then committed my self to a mental ward. i would have filed a suit if most people didnt already know how crazy she was.
I started this season a bit ho hum but like you said Ian, I got inspired by others and in a few other ways. I'm still here, 2 Xmas's ago I almost did'nt make it. Since my Mom passed in 97 I've allways had Xmas eve dinner gathering at my house. Seems every year some one else is'nt there for various reasons yet every year some one new joins us. This year it will be one of my Honeys cousins. I got all ho hum about Xmas lites and kinda did a half @zz job compared to other years. I even told my Honey that I just don't have it in me to do all that, the gutters and 2 trees out front won't be getting lites. I did how ever have to finnish the front of the house below our bedroom. While I was doing that a elderly lady 2 doors down pulled into my drive way and thanked me for keeping "the Xmas lites on" as basikly nobody on our street does lites and if they do it's basic lame. Around this time last year her husband passed away, no lites on there house. For all the other years we have lived here thier house was to die for when it came to lites and decorations but she can't do it. That gave me the "UMPH", this week end and I wraped the trees and even got on a ladder witch I'm not supposed to do and lit the house up. I'm not done yet, I'm still gona do the big self made Xmas tree lite explostion infront of the stairs. Talking with her, she seems sad. My understanding is she has some where to go Xmas day but not Xmas Eve as all her family have other plans away. I'm going to politly pester her to see if she really will be alone then she is more than welcome for dinner at our home Xmas Eve. KInda funny to look back, When Ya Have Nothing, it is the best memories. I was young, poor and in Edmonton Alberta of all places and could'nt make it home. I spent Xmas Eve dinner with a couple and there band of misfits who like me did'nt have 2 pennies to rub together and no where to go. We pooled together and had a great Xmas and dinner. I hav'nt seen Donna and Jerry in over 25+ years now but every couple years or so we still find each other via the phone and pick up rite where we left off. My fisrt X-Mas with my honey...total disaster. 97, we had only been dating a short time, again both poor got nothing. 97 was the year of our disaster snow fall. Deb was going back to Ontario to be with her parrents for Xmas. I bailed off the grid locked main highway in a blizard and did the back roads to get her to the air port. Some how made it there on time but they closed the airport, no flites leaving but they offered bus and ferrie transport free because Vancouver airport was still open. At the last second I stopped her from going. I also had another agenda that nite and was just about to take her spot on the bus to get my daughter who was 9 at the time because of weather and her flite coming into Victoria had been bumped several times due to weather (this was the only year she lived with her mom, and both of there flites were on the same nite). Well to end this novel, My daughters flite was the last one to leave and the Vancouver airport closed. My honey would have gotton on the bus and tooken the ferrie to be stranded in Van. I could have gotton on that bus to be stranded in Van, and my daughter mite have ended up in Victoria with nobody there to pick her up! We were freeken poor, had nothing, but bata boom, we became a family in Xmas 97
The reasons are simple; lack of education, poverty, substance abuse, lack of adequate housing, stupidity and avarice. The solutions, if there are any, are far more complex. And I agree, not worth poisoning your environment trying to figure it out.
Andy's right - one never looks back and says "gee, I wish I'd of spent my time worrying about this or that". Instead the things that are remembered are the things that warmed your heart, kept you moving forward every day, the good music, the good shows, the good books, and the outstanding stationwagon forum threads. I'm fortunate that my wife refuses to do what the Cancer Agency here calls "awful'ize". Many people when they learn they have the dreaded disease immediately think their time is soon to be up. Most people survive and they found that the ones who tended to do the awful'ize thing were the ones more likely to not survive it. Just proves that having Norman's positive attitude is what having a life is all about.
Yep. Did you see the recent newsbite that the province will fine students who miss school under the age of 18? If the education they get is worth attending, then its a valid fine. Otherwise, hardknocks university leaves memorable lessons, and its all homework.
I hear ya Ian, this Dame's nuts!!! She chased after me, I had little interest, she was just some girl I Went to high school with was all. So, she prodded me to ask her out, and I did, lord knows they weren't beating down my door at the time. We went out for a few weeks, and she started having issues in her life, so she wanted to split up, which was no biggy to me, had only been a couple of weeks. Well, one night she came over to my place and wanted to get back together. Well, I was 3 sheets to the wind with some buddies, so I said sure, why not. Things went as they do, we got closer, before I knew she was staying the weekends with me, I had to trade in the old twin for a queen, etc, etc. She wanted me to quit drinking, I was almost there when she left, just a beer or two here and there if I had a rough day. She wanted me to quit smokin', did that, wanted me to quit chewin, was down to once a day at work. Things were really great though. She'd cook for me, clean for me, always treated me good. She just had a troubled past and it made her very insecure, so she required some pusssyfooting around, and quite a bit of reassurance. Well, I was sick on Thanksgiving and she wanted me to drive up to her place, 45 mins each way, and I had only been there once, I didn't drive either, so didn't know the way too well. I said I Was too sick and didn't know the way, she freaked and here we are. I dunno how one day she can go from crying her eyes out because I said I didn't wanna get married right away and naming babies, to not even caring. Some women,huh?
