So,,,,,,,Christmas

Up until this weekend you wouldn't have known it was Christmas, at least not at our house.  No decorations (inside or out), no tree, no Christmas cards or the annual Hassett newsletter going out to family and friends, no rum balls - we just haven't had the heart or the energy.  But Friday Alex & Amy came home and Christmas came out, if only a shadow of it's former self.  That's one of the problems with grief, you re-evaluate all your old traditions; which ones do you keep, which do you discard, which do you change or reinvent?  It doesn't feel right to repeat them as if Ian was still here, it's somehow disrespectful; but you don't want to completely disregard those things that are full of memories and brought you so much joy - that seems to negate his life and all he meant to us. So Friday afternoon, we went in search of a Christmas tree - not too big, not too small but large enough to hold most of the ornaments we had collected over the last 23 years.  We found the perfect $20 tree at Home Depot.  The first words out of the guys mouth when we entered the lot was, "$20 bucks - any tree on the lot".  Eric promptly went to the largest tree they had and actually was enjoying himself (nothing makes him happy like a 'deal').  After some searching we found our tree - not too big and not too small.  Then Alex & Amy got the boxes down from the attic.  Two boxes of ornaments full of memories.  I had been dreading this moment; opening up Ian's ornaments and the memories that each ornament brought.  We placed all Ian's ornaments aside until the very end - his firemen wreath, the glass ones we made one year, his baby cradle, the piano, his bowl of udon noodles, etc.  Our new 'red robin' ornament went near the top then we realized that we didn't have our traditional angel for the top of the tree (it wasn't in the boxes that came down from the attic) so a new traditional was born.  A memory ornament that was made for us by my friend Julie became the perfect Christmas tree 'angel' for our tree - it was exactly the right thing at exactly the right moment.

Today was Sunday and all of us were at church together, everyone except Ian but then Ian hadn't gone with us to church for several years.  The last few years of his life he struggled with questions about God and who He is and what role He plays in our lives so he stopped coming with us to church.  But I hold firm to God's promise that nothing can remove his children from his hand and Ian's decision to ask Jesus to be the Lord of his life when he was younger; I also remind myself of Ian's last words of wonder and amazement at the things he was seeing before he died.  Because of those promises, I thought, maybe Ian is with us this morning after all, worshiping the same God together - his surroundings are just more glorious than ours.  Even if I can't see the big picture or the blueprint that would show us why Ian died so young, Ian can and I can be content with that for now. It's so much more important that Ian knows the "why's" of God's plan and he can see and understand why God took him so soon.  I would imagine he is praising God for saving him from whatever his life would have held for him.

Part of the struggle with grieving is the daily battle to become 'better' and not 'bitter'.  You have to fight against the bitterness, it would be so easy to let it take over but I don't want that for myself or my family.  It's our choice and one we have to make daily.