By M.R. Wilson,  TB Reporter

May there be something bright and happy to sustain you!

Chances are you’ve been up for hours. Presents have been opened and the happy chaos of empty boxes and bows lies strewn over your living room. Everyone has scattered to play with new toys, kids and adults alike.

Chances are just as likely that your Christmas morning looks very different. Perhaps you’re going to work in a few minutes, joining a host of everyday heroes like nurses, fire fighters, waitstaff, journalists and retail clerks. Maybe you’re waiting patiently for busy family members who make the rounds at multiple gatherings and finally collapse at your place for comfort and joy.

Maybe you’ve attended church services, or reflected quietly at home, or finished reading a good book about the season. I highly recommend The First Christmas by Marcus J. Borg and John Dominic Crossan.

The great song So This is Christmas by John Lennon has played in my head for days. The light-hearted melody and simple lyrics belie a deep sense of hope.

“A very merry Christmas and a happy new year

Let’s hope it’s a good one without any fears”

Some say hope is rooted in fear and doubt. We endured a boatload of both in 2016. It is uniquely human to hope for a brighter 2017.

“And so this is Christmas for weak and for strong

The rich and the poor ones, the road is so long”

 How can one not ponder the outcome of the presidential election?

 “And so happy Christmas for black and for white

For yellow and red ones let’s stop all the fights”

 Here my hopeful thoughts linger with the Water Protectors of Standing Rock.

Have you ever had so many thoughts and feelings churning inside that you have trouble expressing them? As though they’re all struggling to get out, trampling each other, creating an impassable bottleneck? You may feel outrage, or nearly stunned to silence, or at the very least, dire need to retreat.

In all honesty, I’m feeling that way this Christmas 2016. What more can be said? It’s as though all the words have been wrung out of me by the punishing Krampus, stuffed in his bag and carried off to the nether regions.

But this remains:  I do wish each and every one of you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. May something bright and distant sustain you, give you hope and call you onward.

Columns | The Sassy Sandpiper | Christmas | TB Reporter

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