Christmas Eve

Christmas waves a magic wand over this world, and behold, everything is softer and more beautiful. ~Norman Vincent Peale

Christmas is a time when you get homesick - even when you're home. ~Carol Nelson

I try to stay busy at Christmas. I treat it like a job or one long to-do list. This is not really ideal and I don't do it consciously. I believe it is a coping mechanism.

Nine years ago I moved to England, a truly beautiful land with beautiful people. I am so very blessed.

At Christmas, however, I miss my son who lives thousands of miles away in New Orleans. I want to celebrate Christmas with him. I want to hear him laugh. I want to feed him pie until he begs for mercy.

I miss my three sisters who live equally far away in Oklahoma and their children whom I adore and their children's children to whom I wish I had the opportunity to be that eccentic Great Auntie in their lives. I miss my brother who used to make the most incredible pot of Chili for our Christmas Eve family get together. He had a shy smile, a deep voice and a laugh that made you laugh. He has passed on now but we still celebrate Christmas with him in our hearts. I do sometimes wonder if anybody thought to get his Chili recipe. Just like after 33 years I still have questions I wish I had asked my Mother.

I will have a lovely Christmas with my husband and his family and of course the irrepressible Dixie (even if she is laid low with illness at the moment). Tomorrow I promise to regale you with joyous tales of an English Christmas. But for just this moment, I would like to remember and hold in my heart family and friends I am unable to touch...

I have let my mind
stroll through Christmases past

With a promise that I will not linger
That the misty sparkle of images
I cannot quite make out
Will not make me mourn but rejoice

For Christmas present is filled
with the light of Christmas past
~me