Well the blog-gods were not on my side earlier this evening. I was attempting to blog from my brand new Palm Treo and after I wrote out the post, twice, I could not successfully click the "publish post" button and therefore could not share my words with the world.
Life is going well right now. We are excited to have our new kittens home with us. We named them Marty and Phil, in honor of Martin Luther and Philip Melancthon, and each has his own, distinct, personality. Marty is outgoing and a trouble maker when he is not sleeping on the couch between Tim and I. Phil spends most of the day under the bed in our second bedroom only coming out to eat or when Marty chases him around.
Thanksgiving was a circus. We hit 3 houses in about 6 hours and saw a lot of family. It's so hard to be this far away when the rest of our families are so close together. One good thing was that some of us had just seen each other at my Dad's wedding (which was fine) and so we were a bit more relaxed with each other. It was a good day overall and definitely helped with the sadness that I had about missing my Mom and Aunts.
Now we are gearing up for Advent and Christmas. December is going to be a whirlwind right until the end. From youth group events, LTSP Advent Vespers, my installation on the 16th, Advent, Christmas and the regular work that comes with the job we will be going non-stop. Hopefully we will be able to stop and enjoy the season a bit as well. As of December 23 Tim and I will have been together for 4 years and it seems like the time has just flown by.
I will try to post some pictures of the kittens soon as well as my thoughts on the season of Advent - of which I have many.
Until then, Come, Lord Jesus.
Thursday, November 29, 2007
Monday, November 05, 2007
So now that my brother has weighed in on the drama that is "Thanksgiving '07" I figured that I would add my two, or three, cents to the conversation - on in this case 'blogersation' (that should totally be a word).
The fall is always tough for my family. We have lots of fond memories of birthdays, anniversaries, and, of course, the holidays. All of these occasions were opportunities for watching football, drinking beer and eating way too much onion dip while women chatted about movies, TV, and fighting over who had a better kitchen gadget and the men hid in the TV room until dinner. It is true, as my brother says, that these gatherings had their own sense of warmth and tradition that helped us to really appreciate our family in a way we might not have otherwise.
With the loss of my Mom, my Aunt Debbie, and my Aunt Karen we are now left with a gaping whole in our lives and, subsequently, our traditions. I can't say that I ever thought about how those traditions would work when we started getting married and such but I am not sure they could get any worse than they are now. And I am sure that I never thought about what would happen if my Dad got remarried at some point. The ramifications of such a union are putting a tremendous strain on my brother and I's ability to hold onto what little remains of our traditions and puts us both in a position of having to choose to be with our Dad or with the rest of our family for holidays, in particular, Thanksgiving.
What is the hardest to understand is my Father's inability to recognize our (me and Ian's) need to be with our cousins. Our family is now unique in that all of my cousins share the same pain, burden, experience of losing our mothers. When something that tragic occurs the only way to gain some kind of perspective is to be with others who have also experienced this kind of loss. My cousin Jenn is trying, without my Dad's help, to establish some kind of tradition to help us all cope with the sadness that now accompanies the holidays. My Dad, though, has been unhelpful with this effort and is making it harder than it has to be to remain a family.
This kind of situation only makes me miss my Mom more and wish that my Dad could somehow understand how much he is hurting the rest of the family. He thinks we should all just get over the loss and move on like he has. Unfortunately, that is impossible for us because whether we liked her all of the time or not, she was our Mother, and that loss is devastating - no matter how old or young you are.
So hopefully we will have a good day and the family will be able to cope with our usual dosage of football, beer, and onion dip even if those who we want to enjoy those things with are gone.
We have been promised life from death and light in the darkness - as the dark grows and the light fades it is now that we need to see life and know the strength of our faith in Christ. Advent is still 3 weeks away but this prayer remains in my heart.
Come, Lord Jesus.
The fall is always tough for my family. We have lots of fond memories of birthdays, anniversaries, and, of course, the holidays. All of these occasions were opportunities for watching football, drinking beer and eating way too much onion dip while women chatted about movies, TV, and fighting over who had a better kitchen gadget and the men hid in the TV room until dinner. It is true, as my brother says, that these gatherings had their own sense of warmth and tradition that helped us to really appreciate our family in a way we might not have otherwise.
With the loss of my Mom, my Aunt Debbie, and my Aunt Karen we are now left with a gaping whole in our lives and, subsequently, our traditions. I can't say that I ever thought about how those traditions would work when we started getting married and such but I am not sure they could get any worse than they are now. And I am sure that I never thought about what would happen if my Dad got remarried at some point. The ramifications of such a union are putting a tremendous strain on my brother and I's ability to hold onto what little remains of our traditions and puts us both in a position of having to choose to be with our Dad or with the rest of our family for holidays, in particular, Thanksgiving.
What is the hardest to understand is my Father's inability to recognize our (me and Ian's) need to be with our cousins. Our family is now unique in that all of my cousins share the same pain, burden, experience of losing our mothers. When something that tragic occurs the only way to gain some kind of perspective is to be with others who have also experienced this kind of loss. My cousin Jenn is trying, without my Dad's help, to establish some kind of tradition to help us all cope with the sadness that now accompanies the holidays. My Dad, though, has been unhelpful with this effort and is making it harder than it has to be to remain a family.
This kind of situation only makes me miss my Mom more and wish that my Dad could somehow understand how much he is hurting the rest of the family. He thinks we should all just get over the loss and move on like he has. Unfortunately, that is impossible for us because whether we liked her all of the time or not, she was our Mother, and that loss is devastating - no matter how old or young you are.
So hopefully we will have a good day and the family will be able to cope with our usual dosage of football, beer, and onion dip even if those who we want to enjoy those things with are gone.
We have been promised life from death and light in the darkness - as the dark grows and the light fades it is now that we need to see life and know the strength of our faith in Christ. Advent is still 3 weeks away but this prayer remains in my heart.
Come, Lord Jesus.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)