GOOD BYE CHRISTMAS

Today, as I was heading to church for cafe duty, I eagerly flipped on Sirius XM, knowing I was on borrowed time for my Christmas music. I will NOT decorate my house before Thanksgiving. I will NOT leave my tree up until February. I will NOT take my tree down the day after Christmas. However, I WILL listen to Christmas music just as soon as the radio programmers decide to play it.  I can't help myself.

So, for the last two months, roughly, I've been listening to all the traditional music on Sirius ... I've been trying to catch all my favorite Christmas movies on TV ... I've been heading to every single Christmas event I can in an attempt to soak up the spirit and magic of the season.

I don't know ... maybe it's nostalgia, but I remember magic during the Christmases of my youth ... I remember anticipation and eagerness ... I remember the sights and the smells. Every year, as an adult, I attempt to capture that and savor it. That savoring part? It's difficult when you work in a job that requires you to work full steam ahead, fly through a quarter, plan-plan-plan, go from special event to special event, and beg just to hang on until Christmas Break because the kids' excitement might just send you over the edge of sanity into the precipice of insanity!

I was heartbroken, when upon firing up my vehicle, I didn't hear the anticipated Christmasy notes coming from my radio. Nope. Sirius gave me four extra days to savor, and it was now time to move on ... search 2019 with eager anticipation. Only, I wasn't ready ... I never am.

And it happens every year ... no matter how hard I try ... I get sad to see the magic end ... I get misty thinking that another Christmas has slipped away ... that another year has come and gone ...

It's a beautiful, sunny day -- the complete opposite of a cold, winter's day (which is just fine by me, thank you very much), but I have decided that I am going to hang on to my magical, Christmasy feel in my house until Twelfth Night. That I will look to tackle packing up all the beauty of Christmas for another year next weekend ... that my heart cannot take tearing it down now. I need just a few more days to stare longingly at those twinkling, white lights ... and look at all the decorations that have come to mean so much to me. Just a few more days ...

Then, I think I will be willing and able to look to the new year and let go of the magic once again.