Christmas Is Always Filled With Magic

This is a photograph of the "N" Guage train that Gregory and I used to put up in the hutch in our home at Christmas time. When we moved to the condo, we decided that we did not have room to properly display it and gave it to Whitney, one of our God-Daughters. She was the eldest so that is why she got it and not Emily.

For a while, at Christmas time the train lived at the home of her parents, Cheryl and Larry, and therefore both Emily and she got to enjoy it. When Whitney got married, she took the train to live with her and Nick in Washington D.C.

Maybe when I am ready to pass on my new "Z" Guage train, I will give it to Emily so they are even when it comes to model trains!

While we love both Emily and Whitney, Whitney is significant to Gregory and me in one additional special way. Cheryl and Larry were trying to decide what to name her and it had to begin with "W" in memory of one of their parents. They were having a terrible time coming up with a name they both liked when Gregory piped in, "Whitney." They both loved the name and the rest, as they say, is history!

Whitney and Nick are visiting with their parents this holiday and this painting was dropped off for me at the condo's front desk. I am tickled to have it as a holiday gift. It is so significant in many fond memory ways of Gregory and my time together, of experiencing Cheryl and Larry's kids grow up, and more.

 

Gifts

Comments on: ""Accept the Gift" by Jane Hirshfield: In the poem, she discusses dealing with receiving a Bull "from the gods" as a gift. What do you do with it? How do you behave? Although the Bull is frightening, you will come to love it and to understand it as you nurture and take care of it. And when the time comes, you will be able to give it back to the gods freely.

While the subject may give you thought, the message is simple: accept it, take care of it, give it back when asked.

Housden comments: " ... life is a series of present moments rather than a linear progression from past to future, that our one true life can only really take place here where we are, and now .... Each moment comes bearing a gift - or is it a curse? - from the gods .... Someone somewhere will always be the recipient of it."

It can be dangerous and frightening or loving and comforting. The latter is easy to accept. The former arrives when something storms into your life and your "comfortable, protecting circle is suddenly broken."

Hirshfield suggests in her poem that it be accepted as a gift, not a curse, even though it may be a sudden illness or loss, a crisis, a storm or any kind. It is a gift because it is the moment you are in and the only one you have.

Obviously, grief, illness, or loss will be heavy and will bring sadness and tears. But in the long term how you welcome it will influence how you come out the other side. Anything that is bigger than the ego's drive to shape experience the way it wants to see it had to be a positive experience.

Acceptance of the moment as a gift is in essence a reminder that "everything in this world is only on loan to us." This awareness helps us to live each moment as well as we can, not miss it. Even though the moment can be taken away from us, "the essence of it can never be taken away from us, the love that has burst open our heart and ushered in a deeper, more vital way of living will always continue."

An additional awareness is that everyone, most likely invisibly to us, is involved in and dealing with their own moments.

Crumedgeon

I hate being a Curmudgeon ... but apparently not. So here it goes. I know that I am not alone in the thoughts that will following. Let me slowly weave my argument before I get to the point.

I get e-mails and hear announcements on the radio and TV. Facebook is full of them. I guess they are necessary and for most people they are appropriate, but they grate on me and raise my hackles.

Don't forget Mom on Mother's Day!

Remember Dad on Father's Day.

Buy that special diamond ring that says love is forever for that special person on Valentine's Day.

Is today someone you love's birthday? Don't forget to tell them you love them with a Hallmark Card (or now an electronic dancing, singing message.)

You know the drill. I do not want to waste my time counting the number of times I get to hear this during any specific period of time.

Well here comes the Curmudgeon part, and I do not hold it against those of you who are not affected by this, but I know many who are!

My mother is dead. She died at the age of 91 on March 27, 2010. She died on my birthday which I actually consider a blessing. She began her next journey on the day she helped me begin mine.

My father is dead. He died at the age of 88 on March 25, 2005. We loved each other but were never close in what might be fantasized as an ideal father/son relationship. The older he got the more difficult and irrational he became, most likely due to old age dementia.

The person I love most in the world, my Gregory is dead. He died on October 4, 2015 due to Dementia/ Alzheimer's related causes. We lived with the diagnosis and his gradual decline for twelve years. The last two were lovingly supported at the Lieberman Center in Skokie and the last three days, as he prepared to leave us, I was at his side.

Many other family members, much loved and missed; many other friends have left this world; the approach of my seventy first year causes me to evaluate how I want to spend the time left to me before I begin my next adventure.

So while I do not really consider myself a Curmudgeon, it is difficult for me to hear all about gifts, and loved ones, and fathers, and mothers, and Valentine's Day and Christmas Presents, etc.

One does not buy gifts for one's memories but maybe that could be worked on. Maybe if the idea spreads, I will become a millionaire? 

Actually for Christmas, I did buy Gregory a box of his favorite cookies and some chocolates which I kept by his remains which live in his Grandma Carrie's sewing box and now that the holiday is over, I will proceed to eat them. 

Maybe my gifts are gifted more in the true spirit of love and remembering and not in the spirit of commercialism or impressing the receiver with how good the giver is. 

I do buy flowers for my mom and dad and for Gregory's as well which are placed next to their photographs and a lit candle for Mother's and Father's Day and on their birthdays. Often I remember other family members and friends on the anniversary of their passing. 

So maybe I am not really a Curmudgeon after all! Whew, I am relieved.