Past Becomes Future – Is It 2005 or 2007?

Dear friends, dear family, dear community,
As usual, we promised ourselves we are not sending Christmas cards to people we see frequently, but then, as we get notes or cards from them, we get cold feet, buy more cards, and send notes after all.

And then we try to plug all the gaps by writing a cover letter – that is, a letter sent to cover those we missed despite all our efforts.

Year after year, new ideas are born, new discoveries made, new insights impending. Some are beneficial, some divisive. But friendships and family bonds rooted in love are deeper and stronger than ever.

While the weight of the years bearing down on geriatric joints can be painful at times, the realization that joy bursts in at just the right moment helps us get us through the difficult times. New babies come along and melt tough old hearts. Young people fall in love. Old folks stay in love and affirm that they made the right decisions years ago.

Thank you for including us in the rites of passage that surround those milestones. We hope you’ll keep March 25 open to come and let us thank you in person, as we celebrate our first 50 years of marriage.

Your steadfast love has gotten us through some of the difficult times, and we dare to hope we have been part of your sorrows and your healing. Thank you for an exchange that goes both ways.

We want you to know that we are here for you, as you have been for us. We wish you the happiest of seasons, whether “holiday” or “Hanukkah” or “New Years,” and many more to come. Pray for peace. Pray for ethics in high places. Ask to be forgiven, sing in thanksgiving, and continue lavishing your love – it will never run out.

Our personal debt of gratitude includes mostly good health, two daughters who have made us so proud, an almost 2 ?-year-old grandson we adore and another, at this writing, due very soon. Add to that list incredibly good neighbors and our extended family of believers.

A new year can be scary. Can 2006 possibly be as bad as 2005? It’s almost as though we have been tested and found wanting, then given another chance, then another to get it right.

Are we ready yet for the next great catastrophe, whether it be microscopic or the very earth moving? If only there were a vaccine for evil as potent as that for flu – except there are already suspicions that the virus can escape by mutating. Evil mutates too, doesn’t it?

Thank you for the opportunity to spend a few minutes together in this space every week. Well, almost every week. Time seems to be doing funny things. Fridays “feel” like Sundays and some weeks don’t have a Wednesday in them at all. Did we eat lunch today? No, it’s October. Huh? We must have skipped September.

Love to you all, and peace from above,
Sallie