What2DoWhen the Holidays Roll in

Holiday Time

Everyone’s time of the year when the holidays roll in.

Is it?

Really?

A good time for when the holidays roll in?

Thanksgiving? Equals family time, but what happens if the family isn’t all that friendly. What then?

Christmas? Another family favorite with everyone kissing under the mistletoe exchanging presents and drinking eggnog.

Or is it?

Valentine’s Day. Memorial Day. Independence Day. Labor Day. Halloween.

And then, we’re back to where we started if you don’t count all the other holidays created for one primary sport.

Spending money.

Nowhere is it written that people have families that they belong to, spend time with, and enjoy each other’s company.

Nowhere is it written that people find the love and warmth that is epitomized on television or the radio.

Now, why is that? Reality can’t be transformed into the world reality of what happens during the holidays for those

folk who have no one to take them in. No one to share or exchange. No one who cares or frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn!

Ouch!

What2doWhen

What are you gonna do?

Call Ghost Busters?

Call the police?

Call the firemen?

Call the welfare office?

Call 911?

All of the above. None of the above.

Many people don’t have telephones. Not even cell phones. Pay phones don’t exist. Landlines are expensive.

Where does that leave them? In the black hole of Calcutta? Out of the loop? Out of your present reality?

You can’t save the world. It just won’t work. Here, holidays are celebrated differently. No one asks where do all

the lonely people go. Where do they all belong?

Behind closed doors. Behind locked doors. Out in the streets rummaging through garbage cans. Sleeping on the

street in cardboard cartons, blankets, or sleeping on park benches.

We see them, but we don’t see them. What kind of holiday are they expecting and enjoying? The sick, the condemned,

the jailed, the discarded, the throw-aways that society refuses to acknowledge. Where do they all belong?

The Holidays

For me, the holidays spell l-o-n-e-l-i-n-e-s-s. Yes, even though I have a husband and a living, breathing son with his wife

and family close by. I’m still alone. For the holidays.

How does one celebrate if you’re insides are not happy inside. Bet you never thought about it that way. Your interior you.

How can you celebrate the holidays if you feel that there’s nothing to celebrate? No tidings of gladness. No news to share.

How do you smile with the world when you don’t feel that you’re part of the world?

It’s a question I have never really answered because I don’t believe there’s an answer for it.

We decorate for the holidays. Why? It makes us feel better.

Do we decorate inside of ourselves to make us feel better? I haven’t seen signs of it.

If you spend money, then you must be happy. Unless you’re spending money for the wrong reasons.

Are you celebrating the holidays for the wrong reasons, too? Like to shove away what you don’t have any

control of? To draw the curtains so you can’t see the hunger, poverty, homelessness, the veterans out on the streets?

Solutions

Solutions are hard to find. Everyone has a pet theory. The government ignores the problem hoping it will solve

itself or go away on its own. Christ said the poor will always be with us. I wonder if HE knew that the poor wasn’t

the only problem stalking America or the rest of the world.

My solution is simple. I finally found the universal truth.

Be happy for what you have no matter how small or trite.

Be happy for only you can choose whether or not to be happy and content.

There’s always someone else less fortunate.

Count your blessings.

Keep the faith, baby!

Until next time… .