I’ve been staring at this Chalkboard for some time now thinking of what to say on a Thursday morning.
It’s the week before the week before Christmas. All I’m thinking is… let’s just get to Christmas and everything will be all right. Then New Year’s is the next week and once we get to that…. everything will be better.
The thing is…. Nothing is going to be alright and nothing is going to get any better. Sometimes the holidays are like kicking the can, punting the ball… we tend to push our troubles to the side these last few weeks of the year.
Tonight I’m going to be Santa for close to fifty children. Tomorrow night I’m going to drink pints with lads I’ve known for nearly forty years. Unfortunately, all I’m thinking about is the phone call that I received Monday morning from DCFS.
I should be excited to share the love of Jumbo Claus. I should be excited for the annual gathering of The Wild Turkeys, but I’m not.
Not only did I get the call on Monday… yesterday afternoon a school counselor called.
So that brings me here, staring at the Chalkboard. Usually when I get too personal on this daily journal, you usually see the sentence…
....“I just erased several paragraphs of crap.”
Today, I’m not erasing the crap. Christmas and New Year’s Day won’t make any problems go away.
I’m going with 8 out of 10 of you Chalkheads are in the same situation. Maybe that number is too extreme?
Probably not.
We all have some sort of shitshow brewing in the backroom. I thought I could leave the shitshow west of Mannheim Road, but it always boils over east.
Then I think that the shitshow will finally go out of business when the youngest Shepkid turns eighteen.
Just like Christmas and New Years, that eighteenth birthday party is an illusion. I can wrap presents and pop the champagne, but after the last Christmas song on 93.9fm is played… life’s shitshow will still be waiting.
It could be health issues, employment issues, financial issues or family issues. We all have something lurking in the shadows of the Christmas tree lights.
So go ahead and kick the can, punt the ball!
Enjoy the love and magic that Christmas always brings. Be encouraged by the promise of a happy new year.
I’m going to make fifty kids happy tonight and I’m going to laugh and sing with ten guys in their late fifties tomorrow.
Everything always works out when you get straight F’s in live…. Always!
FOUNDATION: FAITH, FAMILY and FRIENDS.
