the Day After

The day after Christmas is my new favorite...because this day means that a whole 364 days stretch before me until I have to go through the insanity of being with the people who made me again. Don't get me wrong, but ah. It's nice. And this year had its nice moments...getting lots of comfy PJ's to wear...watching Gilmore Girls fifth season...driving to dinner in my uber-cute outfit...getting a ton (and I mean a ton) of gifts. And most lovely, getting some gifts that signify (from people whom I have already accepted may never understand me) that they have realized I cherish the personal. For instance, I received a handmade bracelet, made just for me and a top I got actually fit. (Usually they are too small...is that in the hopes that I've gotten skinnier since Thanksgiving? Um, no.)

So thank you Jesus for this day... and for the next 363 days of peace.

the Development of Want

I had this really interesting thought today. My mom and I were driving around town (avoiding the malls) shopping for Christmas presents for the various people in our lives that we want to appreciate. And she kept asking me if there was more I wanted for Christmas, cause I have some big dreams like a new bed, but all I really wanted was pajamas and Gilmore Girls on DVD (no commercials!) And I kept trying to think of all those things that one has as fleeting thoughts, such as things I would never buy myself, but that when I am in the drugstore I think, hey it would be great to have an eyelash curler. Or when I am getting out of the shower, I notice my old robe is pretty ratty. But who has time to go buy a new one? And so you just go along and forget those things. But those are great things for an unemployed lady like me. And I was waiting for my mom as we stopped at Starbucks mid-shopping and I was actually expending energy trying to think of things I have wanted, but not wanted badly enough to just purchase for myself. I pondered how much Christmas has become this development of want and all that Christ meant it to be is the development of sacrifice. Jesus' whole purpose on earth wasn't to share the four spiritual laws and offer salvation that will cause all the areas of your life to center around him in perfect order like magnets once you put him on the throne of your heart, it was to die. To give something up for someone else is revolutionary and counter-intuitive and exactly the way Jesus would operate, were he walking in the flesh around Orange County between Thanksgiving and Christmas. I went to see Handel's Messiah at the Performing Arts Center a couple of weeks ago and it occurred to me as the opera began that while the music probably does glorify God, Jesus will never be found in a place like that. He would most likely be down on the corner at the liquor store having a smoke with the homeless guys, the guys whose hands are stuffed in their pockets tightly because they don't have gloves. The guys who are trying to figure out why life is so goddamn hard, why they just get less. This Christmas I have figured out it doesn't even out in the end, some people do just get less. And my New Year's resolution is not to throw all my lovely, expensive gifts away, but to live in the knowledge that some people just get less and try to make sure that those people know they are not alone. Because sometimes I have just gotten less, but most of the time I have gotten way, way more than even I can imagine. And it's true either way, even if it is a cliche, that it's not about that anyway. We are all beggars, it's just that some of us know where the bread is.

Thank you Jesus for being my bread. Thank you that when I feel overwhelming disgrace about being pushed out of the formal dining room, eating my Christmas dinner in the kitchen, you remind me that you have a plan, that your favored son was forced to be beaten and die with sinners. That my disappointment and embarrassment is walking in the way of the cross. That choosing to feel my feelings of disappointment, hurt and shame is a real reaction to the real fallenness of our world and the people in it. But I don't have to choose blame and grudges, I can choose forgiveness and boundaries. And thank you that peace like a river will always attendeth my way, because I will be with you forever in paradise. No matter where I go, or what happens to me, you are calling me from heaven and there is a banquet waiting where I am the guest of honor. I may be sad, and cry more often than most people, but I am now and eternally safe and loved.

Chrismahanukwanzakuh

While podcasting is no doubt a deserving competitor, I really think that chrismahanukwanzakuh should have been in the running for word of the year 2005. Since I am not a fundamentalist, this is not a rant on how the word exemplifies the melding of Christianity with pagan religions, or the watering down of Christmas by people saying "Season's Greetings" or having "holiday" trees; I simply think the creator of this word should get some credit for creating a word that has the same joie de vivre as supercalifragilisticexpialidocious, and is not just an onomatopoeia, it has an actual substantive meaning.

Hurrah for chrismahanukwanzakuh (Not the holiday, the word!) from this little corner of the earth...

Liars and Cheats

It's weird how even after a long period of time, you can still feel such disgust for the evil that someone has done against you. Tonight, I was perusing blogs of friends of friends and I saw some notes that made me angry all over again about someone who really hurt me. It's the kind of hurt you never get over, where someone just insidiously takes your spirit, holds it in their hand and crushes it. And they never say they're sorry, they just move on, guilt-free. A friend of mine had this kind of crushing blow dealt to her, and even I get to the point sometimes where I can't believe how core the wound goes, and then like tonight, I remember the soul cry of myself when it happened to me. How a part of me was killed and damaged in one day, how the betrayal of the Christ within me will never be fully healed this side of heaven. And I am just sad. Because people will never fully understand why I can't get over it. It's not to be gotten over, it's a knife in my back that will always be there. I've learned to live around it, making do, but the smell of this evil is so pungent, the pride of the abuser so deep, that even now, I feel nauseated when I think of it. I get angry all over again. All over again, I want to scream out to the heavens, that he was wrong. That he misused his power. And the people around me just stare in confusion and pity. But it isn't me who should be pitied, nor him, it is the people who stare, because they will never understand. Their eyes have not been opened, they are asleep. Because when it happens to you, something inside you awakes, and you never forget.

And the partying begins...

So, tonight officially begins the 10 days (weekdays and weekends) I have booked with Christmas parties, shindigs, clambakes and the like until December 25th. My goal is to entirely eclipse the true meaning of the Christmas season by eating, drinking and being merry, at a harried pace matched only by the wind screaming past my car windows as I hurtle down the freeway at 80 miles per hour to the next event.

When will I have time to buy presents and decorate, let alone curl up on the couch with a cup of hot cocoa, you ask?? Well, being unemployed frees up all those hours between 9am and 5pm for sleeping and other necessary activities.

Wishlist

I think I have enough tchotchkes, so if you are wondering what I want for Christmas, here is your first hint: My Wishlist