Who's In Charge Here, Anyway?

I've lived in this home for seven years now.

Each year has somehow shifted our family unit. New dynamics; new adventures; new belongings that meld with the old, which were, ironically, once the new.

Each Christmas it happens. I pull out boxes of memories and begin to sift through the treasures as though they are new discoveries ~ only to find that they are. The resurgence of recollections, moods, moments and ideals of history past replay before my mind's eye anew and afresh.

For a moment, transported away to another time, another season of love or lack or lessons learned.

This year I am grateful.

Grateful that I have a home.

Grateful that my house bustles with love.

Grateful for simple pleasures such as cups of tea, or hot cocoa, and videos of The Little Drummer Boy.

Grateful for my daughters' voice on the phone, her smile at my shoulder, her sleeping frame on the living room floor, my son's ever-active antics and roughhousing.

Grateful for my Brainiac husband and his first cousins' penchant for digging out or coderizing moles gone mad.

Yes, I am grateful for what I have. What I've been given. The path I've yet to walk, and the knowledge that the One in charge has it all under control.

Merry Christmas, Father.