let your hearts be light

christmas music...mmmm...i love it. always puts me in the mood for christmas and decorating.
i was in meijer today and saw alabama's christmas album. had i not grown up hearing my mother play it every morning starting the day after thanksgiving, i'm sure i would have just strolled right on by. but today i stopped, picked it up, looked at the back and sang a little bit from each track, smiled and sighed, and put it back in the rack. that's happiness, folks. nothing like remembering your family during the holidays.
then when chris and i were scurrying around glenbrook mall, we ran into sherry and emily. i found out sadly that my cousin phil broke up with his girlfriend sara, while everyone was certain they were going to marry one another. i worried about my dear one, but he's a big boy and i have to remember he can take care of himself. i just love 'im.
i've been congested the past couple days, thinking maybe i'm allergic to a kitty, but i may be sick (who knows?) so i bought some nasal spray and used it for the first time about ten minutes ago, and MAN! i don't think i've ever breathed this well!
during my day off today, i got nothing accomplished. i keep telling myself that i'm going to do laundry, i'm going to clean my room, i'm going to do this and that and that...but then i decide to sleep. not a bad choice, i must say, but i haven't learned the balance between resting and hibernating. :-)
i've been thinking about my brother a lot the past couple days. he's tried to get ahold of me quite a bit lately to talk with me about his life's struggles, but i've always been at work. i love him so much even though we are so very little alike. we have the same mother but we've both had different lives with her. different pieces of time. different memories and arguments. and i love him. it will be nice to see him during christmas. i sometimes wish he just lived closer so i could smother him with hugs. i want him to always know how much he is loved. if not by anyone else, me. i love him, i love him.
today's been a very emotional day for me. i can't quite understand why. but i've already cried twice and i can't really dissect where it's all coming from. it has probably just been building up from weeks ago. after so much accumulation my senses go into overload and i just have to purge myself of all emotion.
speaking of emotion, about running into my mom on friday while christmas shopping at JP...she told me that she is now officially Diane Owsley again. and i really wish i would have had something to say more than "oh, really? wow..." and i know she was glad, and in all reality, i know it's better for her. but then it made me start thinking about dad and adel. more adel. i just feel so bad for him. he's old and alone and stuck in kendallville with no money and no one wants to hire him because of his age.
all of this makes me dwell upon the simple principle that everyone, no matter who they are, how they act, where they've been in life, EVERYONE needs to be loved. needs to be cared for. and who is willing to take on the task? who's patient enough? who allows themselves to succumb to God's will and sacrifice time and energy to someone who may never have known how to share of themselves emotionally? who may have never been taught to care about another person other than himself?
i know God made it so that i would care about these things...but how can i affect change? how do i make the greatest impact or bear the greatest influence? when will being loved by God be enough?
and it never fails during this season, i think of linus in charlie brown's christmas, shining in the spotlight spouting off his monologue from matthew. and it makes me all warm inside. "that's what christmas is all about, charlie brown."
forever and ever, amen.
well, time for more decorating whilst burl ives serenades me...