Holidays can be many things to different people, depending on their circumstances  and environments and a host of other factors. For example, Christmas is filled with excitement for little kids. (I once was one, so I know!) It can also be exciting for older adults, especially if they have the opportunity to spend the time with out-of-state family members. (I experience that excitement every odd-yeared Christmas as we and our four daughters and their husbands and children gath

I remember hearing my Nannie Summers comment that time flew faster and faster as one got older. I never understood that as a child. It seemed to me that Christmas would never arrive. Now that I’ve reached the Social Security-and-Medicare age, however, my opinion has changed. Nannie’s wisdom about time was amazing. It seems that we just got the tinsel and pine needles and shreds of wrapping paper from last year cleaned up when, lo and behold, Christmas is upon us again! We had

Readers of this blog know by now that I’m a bibliophile, I love books and reading them. Granted, I’m selective in what I read, but within certain categories I read avidly. I must be selective in my reading because there are just so many books to choose from. Therefore, I also seldom re-read a book, although I have done so with a few. (So many books, so little time!) As Sir Francis Bacon famously said, “Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be ch

My father-in-law was experiencing atrial fibrillation, his heart rate approaching 200. His doctors were sequentially trying several medications to get it back down to normal. It looked as though he might have to spend Christmas in the hospital. Such incidents around the holidays, days that are supposed to be filled with joy and laughter, are especially hard on family members. And those memories returned to my mind as I visited my father-in-law. Then the next day we got word t

The message of today’s blog post is simple and straightforward. It is no more and no less than the title indicates: Merry Christmas wishes to all of my readers. We live in a world that seems to be falling apart at the seams. World leaders say “Peace” but seem determined to undermine their words by their actions. Politicians call for unity while seeming to do everything they can to provoke disunity. People say they want community but then pursue self. My wish for all who read

As I sat engaged in the various tasks of readying Christmas cards for mailing, I began to muse. I weighed how the practice has changed over the years. I noted the number of people I had to cross off my list because they had died. I considered the rising costs of cards and postage. And as my arthritic wrists and fingers protested, I even questioned why we exchange Christmas cards at all. When I got married and my wife and I began receiving Christmas cards of our own, I institu

More than two weeks (actually 18 days) have passed since my last blog post. I took a little hiatus from blogging so my wife and I could attend to the myriad activities and responsibilities of the holiday season. Many of those were planned, anticipated; a few were unexpected. By the time this Christmas rolled around and it was time to gather the family once again, there were five dogs and six grandchildren–with a seventh en route. One daughter and son-in-law who were having a

I want to take this opportunity to thank those of you who have been faithful readers (and even a few followers) of this blog during the past fleeting year. And thank those of you who have taken time to comment on some of the posts, especially when something in them has touched a chord with you. Often, such comments came just when I was wondering if it is worth the effort to keep the blog going. Some of the posts addressed the writing craft generally and a few of my writing st

Snarled in stop-and-go holiday shopping traffic the other day, I complained aloud the oft-repeated refrain, “This traffic is moving along like Christmas!” Such statements, of course, refer to the perceived (especially by youngsters) slowness of recurring Christmases. But in the moments immediately following my exclamation, I had a fleeting thought and I exclaimed, “Oh, wait! That’s not true. Christmases seem to be coming more often and faster for some reason.” Could it be tha

In the past 24 hours, I’ve learned of the deaths of two friends. One, Susan Ridley, went to church with us and was active in our homeschooling community. She was especially dear to several of our daughters as she directed their children’s choir, helped with various plays and programs, etc. She also had a couple of children who were close to them in age (as well as several who were a bit older). The other death was of a distant cousin and schoolmate from high school. I didn’t

My wife and I had vowed long ago, when our oldest daughter first moved to Wisconsin, that we would never visit there in the winter. We had had enough of cold, snowy weather when we lived north of Philadelphia, and here in Upstate South Carolina we get just enough ice and snow to appreciate what people in northern climes endure for months on end. So when our daughter announced that she would soon be adding to our roster of grandchildren, we began calculating and realized with

When I was a kid, one of the most popular Christmas songs was “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” sung by Gene Autry, “the singing cowboy.” The other day, I was pleased to hear that our two-year-old granddaughter had just added a new word to her vocabulary: reindeer. I thought that perhaps it was from listening to Autry’s song. I soon learned, however, that the source was a different song: “Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer.” When I was growing up, my parents established some C