It’s the morning after Christmas as I write this; sitting at
my desk and gazing out the window. The snow, which started during the night,
continues to drift down and it has bleached all of the color out of my little
world and now there is only a photonegative resemblance of it in black and
white. The wind lifts up little eddies of snow and they swirl around the trees
and buildings, looking for someplace bare to settle on. A month ago, in fall,
it was the leaves that were trying to cover everything but now fall belongs to
the ages and winter is king. Unless someone moves the snow and ice it will be with
us until spring. It’s a subtle change but a change never the less. A change I
have witnessed for three quarters of a century and never tired of.
There have been many other changes in my life—and especially
in this Christmas season. Today there are so many foods for thought to dwell on;
my busy mind can hardly digest them all. The house is super quiet with only the
click of my keyboard and the soft snoring of Molly lying in front of the stove.
Like all dogs she lives in the moment, something I have never mastered. I am a
slave to my memories and all day, like the soft snow outside, they have
whispered incessantly through the dark recesses of my mind, like Marley’s ghost
of Christmas past.
Ten years ago the house would have been alive with
grandkids, with wet mittens, snotty noses and rose colored cheeks, just back
inside the house from sliding down the hill and out onto the icy lake, now asking
for more cookies. Several dogs would all be fighting over the same cardboard
box even though the floor is littered with them. All the women would be off to
town to gobble up the after Christmas bargains. The men are watching a football
game balancing coffee mugs on their knees and telling the kids, “Yes you can
have all the cookies you want, just get outside and play and take the dogs with
you.” But then the kids all grew up and many moved away and she left me for her
heavenly reward and briefly the whole thing fell apart. I wonder if there is a
Wal-Mart or a M.O.A in heaven. If so I know where she is today.
For a while I was like a lost child in a department store. I
was scared yes, because I’d never been lost like this before. But then
something happened and I wiped my tears and sniffed my nose and somewhere out
of nowhere she came. She had suffered the same heartbreak, as I, and I didn’t
have to try and explain what was missing in my life right now. She knew all to
well what we both needed and it was simply-- each other. I guess I never knew--
I never thought, that there could be a new life like this, which could come out
of an old life. That so long ago, there had been a first, “I love you” and then
sadly a last “I love you” but it wasn’t the end of the, “I love you’s.”
Such a wonderful Christmas this year. Those snot nosed kids
now are positioning to have snot nosed kids of their own and so we drove from
home to home and shared the love with all of them. We ate, we drank, we
worshiped the birth of Christ and yes, Christmas will keep changing for all of
us, as will life itself and in the end the love we shared will be what we’ll
remember. The holiday is history and there is a lull right now but believe it
or not I’m looking forward to next Christmas.
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