What Countdown?

Unlike the rest of humanity, I am not anxiously counting the minutes left to shop and cook and mail and blah-dee-blah-blah. I am enjoying the quiet of the New Mexico mountains, regardless of the grumpy in-laws that come with the view.

This morning, the kids decorated a tree that Grandma Kettle cut from the property. Once our homeschool lessons were completed, they warmed up with some chicken noodle soup and went out to throw snowballs at each other. I stayed in to read. I have been picking up, at every chance possible, Eat Pray Love and acquiring a new appreciation for eastern meditation. Every now and then, I text my husband with some small necessity I forgot. He'll be driving out in a few days to join us with a few gifts and the left-behind items. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I am trying to figure out how to get up to Madrid again... that funky little Marin-like town calls me like a mermaid to a sailor. All in all though, it's a very low key week.

I'm jolted back to the average citizens' realities when I see advertisement on TV with panicky announcements that there are only a few days and hours left to max out our credit cards and put ourselves into fiscal and emotional debt for the love of others. This is also the week that millions will stand in line for hours to mail packages that must arrive before the 25th lest the recipient on the other end only have nineteen forgettable gifts rather than twenty. Meals are being planned for fifty when only nine will be in attendance keeping Overeating at the top of our National Pastimes list.

It's at times like this that I truly appreciate my unconventionality.

I thought about the word so much last week... conventional. Convention. People... lots of people convening. Talking about and agreeing upon an idea... or thing... or ideas about things. All milling about in large echoing hallways shaking hands, smiling and talking loud and excitedly about their mutual purpose. Group think. Does anyone remember the Borg? Yikes.

Hussle and hassle all you want. I think I'm gonna go put my iPod in and go for a jog. It's so nice out. And while I'm jogging, I think I'll pray to my God. I think I'll look around at the beauty of this world and thank him for such a serene week. Oh yeah... and for sending his only begotten son so that I might live a beautiful eternity with Him.

Peace.