THE AGONY . . .

I let some people down big-time yesterday. I was supposed to be somewhere -- somewhere important. Somewhere I told everyone I knew to be at. Somewhere I really wanted to be. Somewhere I really should have been.

And I didn't make it.

I had a good reason. That good reason was tough and long and heartbreaking, but also important and fulfilling and eye-opening and comforting. It's just that the good reason took hours. By the time all that was over, there was no going back to my original plan. I couldn't have made it anyway, emotionally, mentally or physically.

Still, I let some people down big-time. And the selfish agony is that after conveying my deepest apologies, I've heard nothing in return. I don't know if those people are mad at me ... or just busy ... or stewing in their disappointment ... or waiting to excoriate me or forgive me in person. I wish I knew.

***

THE ECSTASY . . .

For the first time evah, my family has a REAL Christmas tree!

Poor Omma, she claims hatred for the scent given off by evergreens ... but too bad. For a long time now, I'd been thinking ... I'm unemployed, I have no cash flow, I can't buy my family all the things they want this year. What could I do for them that would be even remotely special?

Well, in addition to the fine (I hope) dinner I'm planning on making for them on Christmas Eve, Cheech and I went out today to buy a REAL CHRISTMAS TREE, evergreen stink and all. A trip to the hardware store to buy a stand, a run to CVS to buy lights that we thought we already had, a couple of tip-overs and more than a few innovative and resourceful decorating tricks later, there it was: the family Christmas tree, all lit up and looking purdy, despite the "divot" on one side. We choose to ignore it.

I'm glad for this tree. So many things about the last few weeks have been unexpected for me, and not always in the best way, and I admit I'm a bit beat. To turn on the lights on the tree and feel a sharp but welcome twinge of Christmas cheer in some dimly-lit corner of my darkened heart was ... exactly what I needed. And my parents ... I've heard them say once so far that it doesn't feel like Christmas, and I hope that tonight, when they come home from work and see the smelly shenanigan that Cheech and I pulled, I hope they feel the same, that it is exactly what they needed. It's just a tree, I know, and one that I know Omma will sneeze at (literally), but still ... sometimes, things that are "just" things are still so much more than JUST.

I did not dare come into Christmas day without a spirit of celebration and thanksgiving in my heart. I did not dare feign joy in the face of Christ's birth and the manifestation of all things good and right. I did not dare come home to my family with a heavy heart and tiredness. I did not dare go before the altar on Sunday with falsity and a lack of understanding and an inability to receive grace.

Thanks to Cheech coming home and spending the afternoon with me, thanks to knowing that I have all my friends and family around me, thanks to CVS and the hardware store and the Methodist church's tree sale, and thanks to this slightly-lopsided, simply-decorated, fragrant and divoted tree ... I won't.