Write about your Christmas (Hannukkah, Kwanzaa, Yule)holiday wish.
Not too long ago, I answered a prompt similar to this one. I was supposed to list the things I wanted from Santa and I answered that the things that I want are intangibles. Then I went on to say that for my kids sakes, I would want this or that and they could get me something.
I basically have what I want. I guess I want to take the view that my life is my Christmas gift and I love it.
TB is a gentle, loving man and he treats me like I was a queen. I feel loved and safe, very secure. He knows that I love him, too, so it’s like we’re handing a gift box back and forth.
There are my kids. They give me a pain in the heinie sometimes but I love them. They are the best kids anyone could ever have.
Beyond that, we have a nice home. We have adorable pets. Our extended family are basically in good health. Everyone’s got health issues and some are more serious than others.
I have the memory of my life with Rich.
When people try to pin me down on what I want for Christmas, I have a really hard time thinking up a list. I have what I want. Then I heard this song:
Do you remember me
I sat upon your knee
I wrote to you
With childhood fantasies
Well I'm all grown-up now
And still need help somehow
I'm not a child
But my heart still can dream
So here's my lifelong wish
My grown-up Christmas list
Not for myself But for a world in need
CHORUS
No more lives torn apart
That wars would never start
And time would heal all hearts
Everyone would have a friend
And right would always win
And love would never end
This is my grown-up Christmas list …
In a way, the lyrics say what I would want for all of us. It would be so wonderful to have a world without war, where no one hated another so much that killing seemed justified. A world like that would be boring? No, I don’t think so. If people could just learn to agree to disagree, there could be lively debates but no one would feel compelled to start a war to convince someone that their opinion is the right one.
I think back to the school playgrounds when I was a kid. If you fit in, life was great. Either you were the center of attention or you got included in everything. But if you were the kid standing alone by the fence, life isn’t so great. Maybe you can’t play well. Maybe you’re new to the school, or fat, or whatever. It hurts to be left out. It hurts to be alone. Well, if everyone had a friend then no one would get left out. Even if just two people were friends, they’d neither of them be alone.
It makes me sick when people do bad things and get away with it. A long time ago, I realized that the good guy doesn’t always win. Sometimes the bad guy wins and there is not a blessed thing you can do about it. Like … I am convinced that O.J. Simpson got away with murder. Scott Peterson is trying to get away with murder. I would like to see a world where there was justice for the victims without sacrificing the rights of the accused.
The other night, I saw an episode of a TV program called Cold Case. It’s a new show and it’s about a police woman who investigates old crime cases. Well, this particular episode was about the mysterious attack on a welfare mother and her young daughter. They were pushed through the bedroom windows of their apartment and fell a couple of stories to the ground below. The mother lived and was in a coma … and then she woke up.
The police woman had a bunch of facts and witnesses that were all like puzzle pieces. Once they were fit together properly, it turned out that the mother was distraught and felt trapped by her situation and her dependence on the caseworker, who turned out to be a child molester interested in the daughter. The caseworker was able to abuse the young daughters of other women because they all felt too helpless to fight. If they fought, their benefits would be cut off. It was terrible and a TV example of the good guy doesn’t always win.
I would love a world in which people treated each other fairly and with respect.
I think that love has its own special kind of energy. I don’t think love disappears just because someone dies. That love changes to something else on a different plane. Maybe it recycles and returns to earth. It doesn’t matter. I think love does go on forever. I think the trouble is that people are not always open for it. It’s there.
I do believe that time will heal a broken heart one way or the other. Sometimes the wound heals cleanly. Other times, there is a nasty looking scar or maybe it’s only healed half-way. One time TB and I were talking about it and it seems when our spouses died, our hearts were torn in two. A scar formed around our amputated hearts and when we met each other, a new heart half began to grow. I wish that everyone would heal like that.
And so the song is my grown up Christmas wish list.
Posted by Cassie at December 3, 2003 09:11 PM