I have sometimes ruined Christmas.
And I did so mostly by having very high expectations ...
of myself,
of others,
and of "the moment."
I had a vision of how I wanted things to go,
a very unrealistic vision,
but a vision nonethless.
And that unrealism
was what ruined
the real.
It is only when I decided
to give up
all that was unrealistic,
that I began
to accept,
welcome,
and learn to revel in
the real ...
The messy,
noisy,
complicated,
beautiful
REAL.
As your families gather
to celebrate
the very REAL birth of
Jesus,
how can you lay aside the unreal,
so that you can accept,
enjoy
and even love
the real?