Christmas Passed

It is December and the kids are greatly anticipating the Christmas season and the arrival of snow. The last couple years have been difficult for me. It's my own fault. I have had a hard time focusing on the "reason for the season" when it still seems to be clouded with the loss of my Dad. I miss him. I am learning to "sing a new song through the pain" as a good friend put it, but it's not easy. It takes more effort to get into the "Christmas Spirit" than it once did, yet I try. I find things to do with the kids to make those memories.
When I was growing up, we started the season by cutting down a Christmas tree. We didn't have a lot of money, so it was always a cedar tree because they grow pretty much all over Missouri. At first, I was thinking they were on our own property; but then I remembered that it usually involved going over a barbed wire fence. I believe my sister still has a scar to prove that. Dad would tease that the tree would most likely loose its needles before we made it back to the truck. Somehow, it always survived. That night, Dad would sit in the Lazy Boy and hand us decorations as we put them on the tree. I loved the smell of that cedar. Mom would make big batches of hot chocolate mix so that we would have something warm to drink after playing out in the snow all day. We would build snow forts and have snowball fights, make snow angels, and of course go sledding. My favorite sledding year was when we took them down the back alley and actually raced down the hill into the woods. I told the kids that story a while back and they didn't seem to think that was such a smart idea, but we had fun dodging trees and jumping over fallen, snow packed limbs. When I was around 11, Dad bought a Polaris snowmobile. That took our Winter fun to an entirely new level. I would sit behind my brother,Ricky, while he drove it for hours in the afternoon. In my imagination, I went on many adventures. But Dad was just pure fun to watch. He would rev up that engine, stand up, and push it the the limits. It was like watching a kid with a new toy. Even when the brakes gave out, it didn't stop us. We just learned to put those winter boots on the ground in plenty of time. It got a little more dangerous when we wanted to cross the street. A snowmobile will go over pavement as long as you pick up speed, but the fact that you had to speed up and couldn't really see if anyone was coming, made it a gamble. Thankfully, Newark was a town of 105 people and there wasn't a lot of traffic. After a while, Dad decided to just keep the snowmobile out at the farm. I often wondered if that may have been the reason. It's a lot safer to ride in an open field where your only obstacles are fences and an occasional cow.
I guess my hope is that my kids will have many happy memories in their childhood to get them through the rough times later on. We will go this next weekend and cut down a tree. We will make a gingerbread house, cookies and candy. We will make ornaments. We will sing Christmas songs, and we will share what we have with our friends and family. But most importantly we will remember that God sent Jesus to the world so that we may have a hope and a future.