One phenomenon that occurred back when I decided to make every minute count is that time really does go slowly. The key is packing a thousand things into each day. Ha! And you thought you needed $24.95 and a membership to Oprah's Book Club to get that useful bit of intel.
Coupled with being all over the joint...I haven't even spent a week in one place for 2 months...I have hardly been near a shop or mall, which resulted in me nearly missing the Christmas hoopla.
If, unlike me, you have actually been caught up in the showpiece of our capitalist society bear with me while I take you on a fantasy.
Usually there is the planning for the family get-together...yes, the time we either loath or just want over and done with...all the 'what do I get so-and-so and what do I get the new partner and their accompanying 3 children whom I have never met?' However, this year I am the only single person in my 11 sibling family and none of them are returning to the family homestead. In fact, even my father may well be away.
So with the declining economy and the many things I am involved with consuming my daily activities, I totally missed the stress of Christmas until a few days ago I was with a group of people talking on this very topic, all of whom were either heading home or to homes of loved ones. Due to commitments, I have to be in Melbourne this year and suddenly was overcome with a sense of loneliness.
Within 2.8 seconds of this worst of human emotions my phone rang, it was my oldest cousin Ray, a man I have looked up to all my life as an example of a real and decent man. In his usual style it was an eight second call and ended with 'right we will see you at our place Christmas Day'.
Isn't it funny how these things happen...but isn't it so overwhelming when they do.
The next day I was packing hampers for the Smith Family, a fantastic charity that enriches the lives of so many underprivileged Australians. There was so much good will and sheer human happiness in that shed at the Melbourne showgrounds I just wanted to hug everyone...and it struck me while being interviewed for the TV news, this is really what Christmas is about, giving and in doing so receiving. As a kid, when we got donated goods during the worst of the drought, my mother made it clear to me it wasn't what was in the hamper that was important but that people put it in there for those they didn't even know.
The beauty of Christmas for me is reaching out and in one way or another affecting someone's life. Ray did it for me with his out of the blue phone call and I hope that I was able to do it for a few kids thanks to the good initiative of The Smith Family.
