Bah Humbug?

Well, I just read a blog that I really enjoyed and it gave me "permission" so to speak for these words!

Check it out:
http://www.margeryraveson.com/2010/11/in-defense-of-grinch.html



While I do not know this writer (she is the mother of a friend-of-a-friend), I was screaming "YES" as I read. Finally. A fellow "Grinch".



I don't know where my spirit of "bah humbug" has come from and I don't know if I like it or hate it. Perhaps, I'm content with it?



You see, I like seeing my family. I enjoy spending time with them. But for some reason, at the holidays, it seems a lot more stressful. Is it me? Is it them? The airport is more crowded. People are more rude. Things seem hectic. Couldn't I just see my family another weekend or few days when it's not so chaotic? I enjoy food. I enjoy drink. I don't enjoy feeling so stuffed and miserable and eating, and drinking, and eating and drinking where every activity includes food and there are like 3 activities a day. Of course, I can not partake, but then everyone would KNOW I am a closet "Grinch" and we just can't have that.

Yet, those are small grudges about the holidays. This time of year is hard for many. A wise 11 year old I spend time with each Thursday told me this past week about his birthday, " I mean, it's the worst day of the year. I go back to school and what am I supposed to tell everyone when they ask me, "What did you get? What did you do?", I try to think of something to make up so no one will know it was terrible and I didn't do or get anything special. Why can't it just be a normal day? And now the holidays are here, OH GREAT."

The difference between "the haves" and "have nots" is so great and it seems to be magnified at this time of year. The "haves" make their beautiful homes even more beautiful with decor and signs of their well-to-do, their time to not only keep their home but decorate it for pleasure. Now don't get me wrong, I enjoy beauty. A pretty wreath of fresh greenery, a big red bow and white lights, do bring a feeling of warmth and pleasure this time of year. However, the tears and worries of this eleven year old just continue to haunt me. He is longing for more. I don't even think it's the newest toy or a perfectly iced cake, but love, support, stability. MORE.

My own experience with Christmas was always "perfect" in the traditional, worldly sense, so maybe I have no unfulfilled Christmas fantasy that I am waiting for and for that I am thankful. I am grateful to have been given so much that maybe this has allowed me to have space to see that there is MORE and to desire that in a deeper way than all this superficial. Hopefully, this is not coming off judgemental of anyone who enjoys the lights, and gifts, and all the beautiful times of the year. There are beautiful parts. But you have to look a little bit harder. And often its the more simple things that are real.

A family friend recently completed suicide. A few days after Thanksgiving. The day after she had called to invite my mother to a Christmas party that was supposed to be this weekend. I can't get her out of my mind, although she was my parent's friend, more than mine. She was very successful as an executive at a huge Orlando institution, hundreds in the community came to remember her life, she had a big, loving family, a mother and father, siblings, a husband and two children. Yet she was looking for MORE. At that last minute of her life, she couldn't find any hope to see what the next day would bring. How does that happen? It's just irreconcilable to me. Hard to move on from. Being in mental health, one of my deepest fears is losing someone to suicide. To missing something in a person, that there is not any hope left for MORE. Or at least MORE on this side of eternity.

So, here I am again, Debbie Downer. I'm sorry. I tell you, don't bring me to a cocktail party!

More. I long to recognize beauty beyond Christmas lights, give to those in need more than a canned food drive, and to feel God's presence every day and not as the surge in church sermons preach "God with us". Emmanuel is here and is the MORE. In July. In December. In May. In this life, before my first breath, and after my last.

And to the young boy, and many others like him (or even worse off), I believe that our Faithful God will be real to him and know him. And hopefully be MORE than enough, despite his have not's in this world.

" Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of Heaven, Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted...Blessed are...." Matthew 5