Just Another Pic on the Wall

still standing! ish...

So the 3 Kings have come with their presents, and Valentine’s Day decorations are popping up in stores large and small. Most of our post-Christmas returns have been made (except for one sweater that the saleslady convinced my spouse to EXCHANGE instead of return…I guess he’ll be going back to Sears, the sweater still doesn’t fit quite right), and even the mega-stash of cookies is down to a manageable 4 Tupperware.

But my house still looks like Christmas.

Santa Claus REALLY comes to town at our house.

Ok, so it’s January. And yes, the prickle-fall of the tree is starting to become noticeable, I know that this weekend the tree and most of the Nativity sets might have to get put away. But my wall of Christmas cards is going nowhere.

And not just because the wall is kind of structurally important, I mean the cards fun-tacked to the wall are staying.

There is something about seeing all those smiling faces that makes me happy. So many of the cards this year are casual snapshots or collages of family pics. Ours certainly was, mostly because I couldn’t get all 3 kids and dog to look in the same direction in any single picture. I love seeing these moments in the lives of people we hardly ever get to see.

To quote that Master of Verbiage, Billy Crystal," You Look Mahvelous!"

I have mentioned our shrunken social circle before (like shrunken heads but not grotesque, just unusually small), between family moving away and friends moving on and our own post-brain-tumor reclusiveness combined with kids getting older and thus busier, we are like Hermits of Suburbia. So getting those cards full of pictures of people we never get to see is a joy.

Some folks on the wall are family far away, some of whom we haven’t seen in years, but we  always vow that We Will Get Together With This Year! Some are old friends from college and before, with kids galore that all look like mini-versions of their parents. Those cards are cool. Some are friends we have only briefly met through brain tumor or NF work. Pics from the beach, on Santa’s lap, on trips or in the yard…the lovely crowdedness of the wall just makes me happy on these gray January days.

I know, too, that this isn’t REALLY like having contact with people…my wall o’ cards is reminiscent of the concept of facebook “friends”, the 400 people you allegedly are close to. But you know, those facebook friends (ok, not hundreds, I admit there are folks on the friend list who are more connections within the support communities we lurk in than friends), a lot of those facebook friends ARE real friends, people I know are there for us at any hour of the day or night (the benefit of having friends in other time zones, it’s always daytime somewhere!). So my card wall is maybe only a point of connection, but it makes me inordinately happy…like a little “hey, we didn’t forget you, and you didn’t forget us, even if we never see each other! Huzzah!”

That said, I do have some guilt, as I realize that my mental card list never fully translated into my ACTUAL MAILED card list. I have about 5 people I feel awful that I never actually MAILED THE DARN CARDS TO, I don’t know what happened, I seriously still have those cards here—to Deedy, and our Lake George friends, and other bt/nf friends…sigh. I am sorry. Maybe I will wite-out the “Merry Christmas” and put “Happy Groundhog’s Day” on our cards and mail them in a few weeks.


ok,  I figured out the issue I was having with photo uploading.
So  behold, a picture of Wite Out!

Heck, if I did that on the wall…just taped over the holiday greetings with seasonally appropriate woohoos, that crowd could keep smiling at me all year, right? ;)

So thanks, card sending folks, there is particular joy each time we add another pic to the wall…for in each of those we feel a little hooray from each of you. And the wall of the Hermitage is looking pretty snazzy.

 

 

 

Prepare Ye the Way...

Prepare Ye the Way
It’s December 12, 4:40 pm, and my hands are stinging from my act of wifely niceness…I just put the lights on the Douglas Fir With The Unexpectedly Awkward Branch (and the prickliest prickles) that stands in the corner of our living room. Things have entered a new realm of crazy here, and our preparations are late and somewhat haphazard. That’s not really different than other years, honestly…

This year’s season of Advent is a season of preparation in every sense of the word; from baking and mailing cards to lighting our special candles and opening our Advent calendar, we attempt to get ourselves ready for what is a high holy day in our faith.

That said, we’ve only lit our candles one time this season and we had to catch up for a week’s worth of calendar days after church yesterday. And the cards are still in a box on my dining room table, and not one thing has been baked here. Yikes.

For us, this season of preparation has taken on a dual role this year. Our anticipation is not just for the birth of Jesus on Christmas, for the lovely celebration of gifts and food and family. This year Advent has become a season of preparing for my 13 year old daughter to restart chemotherapy after a 5 year break.

5 years sounds like a long time. I assure you, it’s not. It just isn’t long enough.

So while I feel a little overwhelmed about the gifts I haven’t purchased and the unbaked cookies, the ghost of Christmas future is standing at the door once again. Honestly, that’s more overwhelming. He’s awfully creepy looking, you know? Even in the Muppet version…he’s creepy.

This preparation is different than our first bout with chemotherapy, which involved the horror of an initial diagnosis, two surgeries, and unspeakable grief and a deep feeling of abandonment by God. This time I have some time, ironically only BECAUSE my G needed unexpected surgery…my grief is deep, but not unfamiliar, and I have made peace with God in this situation. I still holler at him an awful lot, but at least I know He’s hearing me. ; )


This time I can get things organized in my house (well, as much as I NEVER do, alas), I can get some meals in the freezer, make sure I have a game plan for dealing with unexpected days where I have to miss work, and plan strategies to get my daughter through this. Like our Advent preparations, we know a little bit what’s coming at the end of our 3 weeks of preparation. The visions dancing in our heads are NOT of sugar plums, sadly.

And while the immediate end of this season is scary and uncertain, it does bring with it some hope. The drug my daughter is starting was simply not invented the last time she had to fight. And if this one doesn’t work, there are 2 other new drugs that she can try. There is hope amidst the shadows.

At the heart of our hope is my daughter. Just as the heart of Christmas is a Person, the heart of our hope here is my G. She is funny and mighty and full of attitude. Her Jersey girl attitude and her Irish/Italian/German heritage give her chutzpah, and her beautiful soul gives her the strength of heart to get through.
She is scared. She is sad. But she is so mighty. She will get through.

So we will celebrate this season, albeit in a bittersweet kind of way. We will celebrate our time together as a family, a time once again threatened by the Elephant, and we will celebrate our faith, which we know will give us the fortitude we need to step through the door to the new year and the new fight. We celebrate our friends and family who have already carried us through so much.

And in between buying a gift for my mom and the fixings for our Christmas feast, I will buy extra pretzels and crackers for lunches, Costco sized packages of meat and such to make some casseroles, and maybe even a few documentaries for my history classes for those days when we get stuck at a hospital far from home. We will prepare. I will try to find ways to get MY head in the game, to renew my flagging emotional energy for the fight ahead. We will prepare.

Hopefully amidst our chemo preparation we can have a moment to prepare our hearts for this most beautiful day that is on the horizon, this reminder that we are so loved that a child was sent to us…and in that moment, I will thank God for my children, and for my love for them.

This hurts. A lot. I can’t lie about that. There are moments in the day where I feel like the air is sucked from my lungs and I’m teetering on the edge of some kind of void. But I will get my game face on. We will prepare, and we will roll with the punches, and we will get through. I have to think that even Mary, as she prepared to have Jesus, was a bit taken aback by having to schlep all the way to Bethlehem. Just the thought of donkey smell while pregnant…ugh. Her preparations were challenging too. Hm.

From the kitchen just came the call, “oh my gosh, Christmas is so SOON!” from my 13 year old. If she can focus on Christmas, I should too, right?

That said, maybe I should try to get some baking done…then I will have cookies to munch on while I prepare for whatever is to come. : )