Strange, isn’t it? Each man’s life touches so many other lives. And when he isn’t around he leaves an awful hole, doesn’t he?
Oh, hot dog.
(quotes from It’s a Wonderful Life)
Christmas morning, 2020, 4 a.m.
This is the 12th and final day of my musings under the Christmas tree, or at least my blogged ones. I wonder sometimes why I have chosen to do this. To have a sense of connection, perhaps, in the midst of our chosen isolation. I have received some very dear notes from friends who have read them, and they have meant so much. Thank you.
Sending these reflections out into the world has not been because I felt anyone needed to read them. I really do believe we teach most what we need to learn, so perhaps I needed to say them more than you needed to read them. More than anything, I reckon, they have been a window into my own heart and soul, a picture of my fears and longings and hopes, and provided a wished-for sense of connection.
I wish everyone a wonderful Christmas Day, whatever that might mean for you. Yet one more time, I cried over the film It’s a Wonderful Life last night, and allowed myself to believe in the magic. Imagination can be more real than believing you “know” if you let yourself go there. For 40 years, I have had a framed quote hanging at eye level in my bathroom: to know is nothing at all; to imagine is everything. I needed to read that a lot, I guess.
So — if we can never really know, believe in what gives you hope!
All of which is to say I wish for each of you an angel named Clarence or Joe or Florence, just like Jimmy Stewart had in It’s a Wonderful Life, who, in the midst of pain and despair, will tell you in no uncertain terms just how valuable your life is. Merry Christmas!