penandpatience

WRITERS WORDS: “Christmas Day is in our grasp, as long as we have hands to clasp! Christmas Day will always be, just as long, as we have we! Welcome Christmas while we stand, heart to heart, and hand in hand.” – Dr. Seuss

Readers: “Late Bloomin’ Writer,” my non-fiction essay, has recently been published on http://www.writeradvice.com under the heading “You Can’t Make This Stuff Up.  Stop by the site and let me know your thoughts.

CHRISTMAS – DECEMBER 2022 – A TIME OF CELEBRATION AND HOPE

DECEMBER 2022 MONTHLY MUSING

December, a time in the Northeast when temperatures drop low and folks hope for a snowfall to prepare for Santa’s reindeer. December is the last month in this tumultuous year, 2022, in the U.S. and abroad. It’s a time when we look past the year’s trials and tribulations and look forward to holiday celebrations with renewed hope for the season and the pending New Year.

I reminisce…I received a much-wanted Sparkle Plenty doll when I was a child. Do any readers recall the Dick Tracy columns/cartoons years ago? Mom baked scrumptious Christmas cookies every year along with Italo-American specialties for the holidays. A special brass Christmas bell that played “Silent Night” hung in her living room archway every holiday season. (PS. My grandson found an identical one years later in a Payson, Arizona antique shop and gifted it to me one Christmas.) My bell remains up year-round and Silent Night is heard often during the holiday season and sometimes beyond.

I muse…Christmas is a special time for children. They look forward to Santa Claus bringing them one of the latest technological or electronic toy, new bicycle, or much coveted sports item. I discovered this poem many years ago about the many diverse gifts we can share with our children – “What Shall We Give the Children:

What shall we give the children

Christmas is almost here.

Toys and Games and playthings,

As we do every year?

Yes, for the magic of Toyland

Is part of the Yuletide lore

To gladden the heart of childhood,

But I shall give something more?

I shall give them patience,

A more sympathetic ear,

A little more time for laughter,

Or tenderly dry a tear.

I shall take time to teach them

The joy of doing some task.

I’ll try to find time to answer

More of the questions they ask.

Time to read books together,

And take long walks in the sun.

Time for a bedtime story,

After the day is done.

I shall give these to my children,

Weaving a closer tie,

Knitting our lives together

With gifts that money can’t buy.   – Author Unknown

I digress…A family member was writing poetry since high school days and continued throughout her early life and retirement years. She was honored with a Silver Poet Award for her book of poetry, “Random Thoughts,” from a publisher in Sacramento, California where she traveled to receive it at age 83!

Peace for Christmas

Again, it’s almost Christmas Day

And time to bow our heads and pray

To every sense of Reason/

To seek and search each avenue and lane

For hope that joy and peace

Will Reign

Throughout the Christmas season. – Margaret E. Weldon

MERRY CHRISTMAS AND A HAPPY NEW YEAR TO ALL!