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| Bissonnette's Christmas Gazette December 2008 Horicon, WI e-mail -andebiss@powercom.net |
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| Above: Dad with Phillip in 2003 Our wonderful grandchildren: left-Paelun and below Nora and Phillip |
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| Santa Claus Extended by G. K Chesterton "What has happened to me has been the very reverse of what appears to be the experience of most of my friends. Instead of dwindling to a point, Santa Claus has grown larger and larger in my life until he fills almost the whole of it. It happened in this way. As a child I was faced with a phenomenon requiring explanation. I hung up at the end of my bed an empty stocking, which in the morning became a full stocking. I had done nothing to produce the things that filled it. I had not worked for them, or made them or helped to make them. I had not even been good--far from it. And the explanation was that a certain being whom people called Santa Claus was benevolently disposed toward me. Of course, most people who talk about these things get into a state of some mental confusion by attaching tremendous importance to the name of the entity. We called him Santa Claus, because everyone called him Santa Claus; but the name of a god is a mere human label. His real name may have been Williams. It may have been the Archangel Uriel. What we believed was that a certain benevolent agency did give us those toys for nothing. And, as I say, I believe it still. I have merely extended the idea. Then I only wondered who put the toys in the stocking; now I wonder who put the stocking by the bed, and the bed in the room, and the room in the house, and the house on the planet, and the great planet in the void. Once I thanked Santa for a few dolls and crackers, now, I thank him for stars and street faces and wine and the great sea. Once I thought it delightful and astonishing to find a present so big that it only went halfway into the stocking. Now I am delighted and astonished every morning to find a present so big that it takes two stockings to hold it, and then leaves a great deal outside; it is the large and preposterous present of myself, as to the origin of which I can offer no suggestion except that Santa Claus gave it to me in a fit of peculiarly fantastic goodwill." |
| No major plot lines this year by Debbie Many years ago my sister Emily and I used to watch the soap opera �The Days of Our Lives�. There was a family on the show, the Hortons, who had this delightful Matriarch and Patriarch who rarely had any major plot lines but the writers would trot them out at the holidays to create that wonderful sense of history. Well, it appears to Emily and I, that we are becoming the old ladies who get to make their appearance at the holidays like Mrs. Horton. I�m happy to report that there were few major dramas in my life this year. There have been enough problems out there in the world to keep me grateful that none of them were my particular problem. I am hopeful that though things look bleak on the economic and other fronts we have a new administration coming in that I can feel proud to have representing our country. They are not about dramas either but about solutions and I wish them the very best as they take over the responsibility for the mess we�ve gotten into. Of course our grown up children are making their own lives now. So though they have some dramas (which sometimes cause me to worry) I try to remember that they are the heroes of their own stories. Even in difficult times it really helps me to focus on what�s not wrong...that�s where the quote above comes in and also the G.K Chesterton piece (sent to me by a friend) coming up next. |
| Merry Christmas Everyone ! |
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| Above: Mema was getting ready to make basil pesto with Phillip and Nora in July. Nora picked the basil from my herb garden. It sure did smell good! Right: Mema/aka/Nai Nai gives Pae Pae his first lesson in the Hokey Pokey at Thanksgiving. That's what it's all about! |
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