A Christmas that Morphed into New Year’s Day

Only forty-two seconds left for the beginning of the 2012,
Times Square, New York City.  (TV Screenshot)

As I begin to tap out the first words of this post, it’s 10:33 pm on New Year’s Eve in the vicinity of the Nation’s Capital.  The darkness of the night has enveloped the area, and the family clan has just finished unwrapping Christmas gifts – a counter-cultural move, but one that worked out quite well for everyone.

This year, we all decided to tone down the holiday frenzy as much as we could by not packing in too many activities into the Christmas weekend.  That meant putting the gifts aside for later.

Instead, the clan agreed to congregate early on Christmas Eve at our home in Bridgewater, and to enjoy a reunion that would concentrate on the pure joy that comes from focusing solely upon one another, instead of upon the gifts that we traditionally exchange.

Good decision!  

Just Another Day?

A Bridgewater Sunrise.

As the sun rose in the east today, just outside the window from my writing desk, I marveled at how often I take for granted – as I suspect many of us do – that we will be around to see it rise tomorrow, the day after that, the following day, and for an endless string of sunrises and sunsets  . . . 
 
. . . and that we will be able to enjoy another day of work; of studying; of being loving parents; of admiring the progress of our children and grandkids; of rejoicing with friends and relatives who are close to us; or of merely engaging in all of the other myriad activities of life. 
 
But there is no guarantee that what we are pursuing now will see the dawn of tomorrow.  There never was.  There never will be.  Fate can intervene at any time for any one of us, no matter how rich or how poor, how healthy we may be at the moment, or how much absolute control we think we have over our individual destinies in life.