yuletide

This Christmas has felt a little...uncomfortable? Like, homemade gifts but somehow Tan and I aren’t giving each other anything. There’s so much sentiment in every moment and lingering fatigue always lining it. Inadequacy feels like the demon dogging every step.

That inadequacy makes my culture clash with my faith. Americans are adequate. We’re the best, the most independent, the most self-sufficient. And yet God wants me to be dependent on His strength, because the job He has for me is not able to be completed with human ability. I wonder if the constant awareness of inadequacy is a blessing or a curse.

So I guess we move forward into the New Year, we keep trusting, and we keep knowing God’s way will be the way.

Pictures from Town

 

(J with a skull on a stick)

 

(Sunrise in town)

 

(The real Christmas tree)

(My small sparkler contribution to the fireworks) 

Make That Goose An Albino Turkey

That's right, albino turkeys.  Or maybe they're just white turkeys.  Calling them albino certainly makes it sound more exotic, though.  Either way, our neighbors here at the guest house have a whole flock of them.  Is it a flock of turkeys? Or a gaggle? A host? A murder?  I digress.

For the first time in about 5 weeks, I'm able to spend a few minutes this morning just soaking up sunshine.  Sure, my chair is soggy, my feet are thoroughly dusted in chalk, and J brought me a dead thing on a stick, but the sun is shining.  Somehow that, of all things, makes it feel like Christmas.

We're spending Christmas in the "Tricycle Capital."  I'll do my best to get a picture of the roads before we leave because it's chock full of motorcycles with covered sidecars, AKA tricycles.  I love reading their names as we drive past them.  Usually, the bike has one name and the sidecar will have another name. For example: today one of the bikes was Angie, while her counterpart was Lena.  It makes for an interesting drive across town, to say the least.  This Christmas, I'm thankful that I don't have to drive at all while I'm here.  I don't think my heart could take it. Just being a passenger gives me palpitations.

Last night, we set up our "real" tree, which is actually a fake tree, but it's more real than a paper chain tree. That, paired with the promise of baking some time today, makes a girl really feel like it just might be Christmas in 6 days after all.

Christmas Pictures

 

(The girls and our tree)

 

(From my flight into town)

 

(The nice ankle deep mud we hiked to the helipad in)

Merry Christmas 🎄

The Goose Is Getting Fat

As Christmas comes closer and we relocate to town for the holiday, I find myself wishing it felt more like Christmas.  There is something distinctly non traditional about waiting for one last helicopter flight on an open porch through spats of chilly rain. Of course, we're looking for Christmas cookie recipes, discussing different egg replacements, planning where we'll put the tree, and maybe I'll feel more like celebrating once we start those activities. If only that dang helicopter would get here.

Of course, this feeling eventually dissolves into a "Vivian-get-yourself-together-remember-what-Christmas-is-really-about" mood.

My Instagram loaded for the first time in a while, because usually won't load my friends' posts even though I can post, and I was amazed to see snow.  It's all fairy lights, and Santas, and Nutcrackers, and cookies, and trees, and I don't even miss it. I don't feel like anyone should be doing those things. It isn't time!  Except that it is.

So, bah humbug and Merry Christmas!  Feeling the season or not, I'm the happiest I've been in a long time, and I'm thankful enough for that.