Tonight should be a quiet night, full of opportunity to sit quietly and ponder the year that has been. Maybe it will be that for you – or maybe instead it’s a night of fuss and madness as toys are assembled, menus are sorted out, presents are wrapped, and the dog sneaks into the kitchen and eats the rib roast.
Whatever it is, the chances are good that this Christmas Eve is considerably different from past ones. Perhaps you’re meeting family and friends through Zoom. Maybe there’s an empty chair at your table. Maybe your house has been afflicted by illness or job insecurity. Maybe instead of putting together a food box, you’re on the receiving end this year and you’re bewildered about how that came to pass.
Regardless of what 2020 has thrown at you, take comfort in the knowledge that you are loved, you are worthy, and you are enough. Every. Single. Day.
Here, I added yams to the Reverse Advent Calendar box and I’m surrounding myself with comfort in a mad world (for 2020 does seem to have been a year of madness). I made sure to fill the bird feeders and I chopped up the last harvest pumpkin to feed the woodland critters.
A crafty neighbor gifted me with homemade soap and I’m looking forward to a hot bath on this rainy, cold Christmas Eve night for my Diva drill.
From the bookshelf, I’m suggesting A Christmas Carol by Dickens. I know you know the story, but pay attention to the very end of the ghostly tale. After Scrooge has had a life-changing event, Dickens tells us: “Some people laughed to see the alteration in him, but he let them laugh, and little heeded them; for he was wise enough to know that nothing even happened on this globe, for good, at which some people did not have their fill of laughter in the outset; and knowing that such as these would be blind anyway, he though it quite as well that they should wrinkle up their eyes in grins, as have the malady in less attractive forms. His own heart laughed: and that was quite enough for him.“
Live according to your own lights. And consider taking up the Icelandic tradition of the “Christmas Book Flood.”
For tonight’s holiday celebration, listen to Christmas music that you love, whether that’s the Mormon Tabernacle Choir or John Prine or the Pogues. Watch holiday movies that you love.
The world, for one brief night, is a little kinder than it often is. And that’s due to us trying a little harder. Marvel and remember.
Sleep well, Divas. And see you tomorrow.
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