Merry Christmas

It was such a nice gesture, it made me cry. My family has a long-standing ritual for Christmas Eve where we burn candles and read the story of the birth of Jesus from the Bible. Back when we were young we also sang "Silent Night", but that has sort of fallen by the wayside. Never mind . . . it's still a good ritual.

I am working tonight in order to allow the younger employees to do their thing with their children. There's not much going on anyway, so it's not much of a sacrifice. I'm watching whatever bowl game is on TV at the moment. (Although a little earlier I was busier than a one-armed paper hanger. The girl who ran the switchboard today failed to switch the phones into night mode when she left, so no one could get through to us! I just thought we weren't busy. Then I had to catch up. Anyway . . .)

I had asked several of my family members to call or text me when they were about to burn their candles so that I could burn mine "with" them. Lil Sis obliged, and my candle is still burning. However, around 7:00 p.m. my son called and said they were about to burn candles, so I lit mine and was preparing to bid them all good night. Suddenly I realized he had me on speaker phone and was reading the Bible story. After that my grandchildren read "'Twas the Night Before Christmas", taking turns reading passages. It literally brought me to tears.

I don't have much Christmas spirit. I don't know why. I just don't. (Oh, I do know why but it's so illogical.) But tonight I am filled with happy memories and looking forward to the coming year.

It has to be better than this one.