It is time to take a minute and think about the spirit of this season. How many times has something happened this season that caused my heart to grow a few sizes? It would be so easy for my heart to shrink to the size of the Grinch's. If i focus to long and too hard on my cancer or chemo path it is easy...so easy to lose sight of all the other good working in my life. So this is the post I will devote to looking for the good. Finding the ways christmas spirit has worked its way into my days.
- I am having trouble with my back and my breathing so I use a wheelchair to get around on longer outings. My mom and I were trying to get into Dillards...the store has double doors with no automation for the handicapped. Each time (on the way in and on the way out) somebody was nice enough to hold the door for us.
- Usually the family spend time closed up in our rooms doing whatever we want. This month we had some time together. It might have been a simple chinese dinner spent together at the kitchen table...or an episode of something we all like to watch. Whatever it was we were together enjoying each others company!
- An afternoon spent with my aunt decorating my house for the season. She didn't have to help, but she did. Sometimes I have a hard time motivating myself, and she took time to motivate me into making my house happy.
- My dad also spent his afternoon decorating. He put my aluminum tree together and hung all my 12 days of christmas ornaments on it. He helped wrap my big tree with a strand of colored lights and the garland that I love. I'm not sure what I would have done without my two little elves. Actually I do know and I makes me a little sad...I would have hung the stockings and maybe decorated the tree. I don't have to be sad...because my dad knows what this holiday means to me and he would never let it go undecorated!
- I get to live with my parents...feels weird to type that. People are usually happy to get away from their parents...that sounds really harsh...I was happy to be independent and create my own home. Then I got sick...I needed help...my parents moved into my home...they left everything behind...my dad added a 2 and a half hour drive to work...when he could get to work in about 15 minutes...my mom gave up a job she loved...no second thoughts...no bitter feelings. If I do express any guilt about them leaving these things behind...they simply say...we are family...that's what family does.
- My puppy warms my heart daily...but today she was a little bit underfoot for the decorating process. The highlight for me was when she found my felted ball garland. To her it just looked like lots of little balls ripe for the taking...and take she did. Shortly after the taking came the dropping and then the rasping so that she could get the felt fibers out of her mouth. She finally settled on a large helping of water to wash them down. Maybe in a few days she will make a colorful present in the back yard!
So I have lots of things to keep my heart warm all the way to January! What has been warming your heart this month?
to the moon and back,
Sarah
Yesterday I woke up feeling pretty awesome...not even awesome for one day post chemo...just plain awesome. The Bug and Mimi were going to decorate gingerbread houses and I really didn't think I would feel up to it, but guess what....I did. I was dressed and ready to go when Mimi got home from jazzercise. I think she was a little surprised to see me...ready to go anywhere. Like I said, yesterday was a great day. It was the Bug's birthday and I just decided it needed to be a good day. I don't want her youth to be speckled with good memories amid tons of memories of things her mom missed because the chemo made her feel sick. I don't want my disease to define her teen years. The fact that it seems to be defining my thirties is such a bummer. So off we went to decorate gingerbread goodness.
I should have known how this would pan out. I got really into decorating my house, and the Bug was over it after about 25 minutes. It was fun to watch her stream of consciousness decorating. Her house is dotted with large white gumdrops. Her backstory (there is always a backstory) is that an old geezer lives in the house and the children of the neighborhood like to give him a hard time. So they throw large snowballs at his roof. So her house has at least 4 large white gumdrops stuck in strange places. She has a tree in the front with a candy cane resting against it. Mini houses need candy cane love too. After she finished her house and left my mom and I at a table blissfully decorating our houses...she made friends with a little girl who was there to help clean up after we finished. They talked about dance...the little girl had been in a local performance of the Nutcracker...the Bug likes watching other people dance.
At the end of this experience...I was the one who had to be hurried along...pushed into being finished...cajoled out of the building. So I think a merry time was had by all...even if we only had an hour to complete our gingerbread masterpieces!
to the moon and back,
Sarah
Pics of the day
