Happy December 2009!

Happy December!

The weeks ahead of us are full of joy, sadness, stress, frustration and laughter. I cannot think of a month throughout a year that brings so many different emotions and often very strong. I hope that these next few weeks of discussion will help you through these most trying weeks of Hanukkah, Winter Solstice, Christmas, Kwanza and the dawning of 2010.

I get caught in the expectation of the holiday season and remember the joyous carefree times of my childhood. So I get sad when it does not have the same feeling of running down the hall, in my jammies, bed head, morning breath and all, to look at the excitement of what Santa left me. You see until I was older and had some sort of concept of money (though this was not until recent years, LOL!) how incredibly stressful this could have been on my parents.

Not to mention that I have mammoth stocking that my parents would try to fill every year. You see, I came home on Christmas day in 1972 in that red stocking. Now it fits like a long tube sock, but at one time baby Rhonda was snuggled down inside. To fill that stocking is impossible as not only have they, but Tammy too has tried to fill this stocking. All to come up with a lot of extra stocking at the end. If it was a bag of chips, we would be good to go with some snack-mosphere.

Now that red stocking, tho full, does not have a physical thing inside of it. It is full of joyous memories and with love. Though many of the memories involve people in my life that have moved away or passed on, but they are still in my heart. My grandmother laughing at my bear claw bedroom slippers and putting them on and motoring around with her walker wearing bear feet or my friend Walt who wore a Santa hat and a big grin almost all of December.

So this holiday season, try to remember what and who you do have and not what you do not. Let those around you know they are important and not just during December. It is easy to not appreciate what we do have until we do not. Especially when there is love involved and a warm and fuzzy memory of years gone by. Do something special in memory of those no longer with us and let them know that you love them, chances are they are not to far from hearing. (I buy a poinsettia and give it to someone in memory of my grandmother and always wear a Santa hat on Christmas Eve with a big grin.) They are most likely a guardian angel looking over you and they too love you too. You'll know that something special to do.

Happy December!
-Rhonda