It Just Burns Me Up

For most of us it is Christmas Shopping Time…notice the caps. Christmas is a big deal for me. It is the one time I really let the kid in me run amuck. I love it. The whole idea of it appeals to me. I guess that’s why I collect ornaments and get all hyped up about the tree and decorating the house. Yes, I’m fully aware of the spiritual importance of the season, but I also love the social aspects of it…the parties, the family gatherings, the excited kids, and the shopping!!!! I like buying and giving gifts so much that I Christmas shop all year long. I keep a huge plastic bin at the ready and I fill it up. Sometime around mid-year I’ve generally secured everything on my list, and by November/December I can’t resist getting just one more thing for the people I love. So, I start all over again. I know… it’s sick, but hey what can I say! I’m a Christmas gift givin’ fool.

As I think I’ve said before, it’s my mission to see that these nerds I work with dazzle their women with great presents. I’m so all over people about gifts. Not for myself…I don’t have much of a list, in fact I have no list at all, but I like to know that I’m doing my part to ensure the women of the world are treated like queens during the holidays!

A few minutes ago, I heard one of my Christmas protégés bitching about how much money he’d spent on a diamond necklace for his wife. The sad thing about it was that he was serious. No joke, this man was really disgusted. Well, I was appalled and told him so. I told him that he was devaluing his present with every word he spoke. I asked him how his wife could find any joy in something he’d given her with so much resentment. I suggested that an inexpensive gift from an uncomplaining heart would mean more to her than a diamond necklace wrapped in bitterness. I usually don’t get mad, but his attitude burned me up. I’ma have to work with this guy. He just ain’t got the right spirit!

Nobody wants to force people to do for them. If it is forced it’s no fun. No fun at all.

Here’s to giving from the heart and not from some perverted sense of obligation!

My Father's Flowers

Over the last few weeks, I’ve been working with my Father’s office to plan his retirement party. The event is tonight and his company has asked me to make a short statement. I’m holed up in my own office looking out at a still dark world thinking about what I will say. In many ways, I’m at a loss.

What do you say about the first man you ever loved? About the one who set the standard? About the one that gave most of his adult life to seeing that you were properly cared for? About the one who was just mean enough to make you just tough enough to survive some of life's harshness. About the one who wasn't so mean as to leave you out there to flail around on your own? What do you say about the man that was, and in countless ways still is, your security?

Well, I suppose all you can say is thank-you, and all you can do is spend your life proving that his effort and sacrifice weren’t in vain – that they really did mean something?

Our children are the fruit of our work. Tonight I want to be good fruit.

I’ve always wanted to make my Father proud, and it thrills me to no end to know that in many ways I have. We function as peers now, my Father and I. We sneak off together and talk. He tells me things I don’t think he even shares with my Mother. I love it. I love being an insider. I love being his confidant. I love our “dates”.

My Father is generally the first person to take me to a new restaurant. We sit at the bar while we wait for a table and discuss business, analyze current events, and lament over family problems. He rarely approaches me as his daughter, and unlike my Mother he stopped seeing me as a child a long time ago. My Father deals with me as a woman. He trusts my judgment and I rely on his. It really is a wonderful relationship.

I’m so excited about the chance to publicly acknowledge him. I’m especially grateful that I get to do it while he’s alive to hear it. So often the accolades come only after we’re dead. My Grandmother use to say, “I want my flowers now, they’ll do me no good when I’m gone.” Well, my Grandmother was absolutely right! Tonight, I’ll give my Dad his flowers while he’s here - while he’s still able to enjoy them.

Here’s to making our parents proud!

Winter

I’m just going to ramble today. I need to. I’ve got so many things to sort out that I don’t even know where to begin. One million stories are floating around in my head pestering me, all of them vying for my attention, dying to be told.

For the first time in my life I understand what it must be like to have ADD. I understand the frustration of being unable to concentrate, fully focus on just one thing. I’m not much of a multi-tasker. I generally throw myself head first into a project and fight it out till I get the results I’m looking for. Generally that’s the way it’s been. But the general doesn’t seem to be applying right now. Things are changing so fast that I’m almost confused by the sudden and unrelenting assault of newness…new professional connections, new friends, new ambitions, new desires, a whole new vision of who I am and who I want to be. Every single thing I encounter has a new meaning that demands to be explored, fleshed out, run through this processor that is my mind. Unfortunately, it’s not just the thinking, the analyzing, or the re-defining that is consuming me. No, it’s the desire to write it all down that’s taking over my life. Write it…something in me demands. Write it. So, I write…and I write…and I write.

In many ways I am out of sync with the season. At its worst winter represents death. At its best - hibernation. Winter comes and things stop, go underground, wait it out, rest. But my winter will not rest… it will not wait … there is no stopping. My winter is like spring. Alive and growing- forcing old things rightfully buried under winter’s frozen ground to surface and bloom. What grows in hard earth? Certainly nothing tender, nothing delicate. Surely only the harsh can survive winter’s onslaught. Hard frozen earth must yield the tough, the sturdy. It should, but it doesn’t. It isn’t. Yes, I am out of sync with the season. Life’s winter is my spring and I grow beautifully tender among the dead.