IHOP Girl: No Presents!!

Tuesday, December 20, 2005

No Presents!!

Yes, I have done the unthinkable! I have not done any Christmas shopping, and it is five days till December 25th. Usually I am not such a slacker, but this year with school it has not been possible. Thus, I am left dreading the drive to the mall, and surrounding stores. Yuck! I hate shopping...More to come later.

4 comments:

ViNeYaRD WoRSHiP said...: Though it puts me in danger of appearing overly fruity, might the vintner venerator suggest yet another luscious orb ripe for the picking?

You must look beyond, which is to say through, your WINDOWs to see that an APPLE is always a tasty treat...

Unlike that other p-a-n-e through which your gaze must be cast, it will never 'crash'...

...and though I've often been know to smash a bit of fruit for fun - may Dinoysus know no offense - an APPLE any day is meant to keep the doctors away.

Vegetables are not always my forte. Yet, though SFL abhorrs them, I've been 'EYE'-ing several PODs as gifts myself. Please pass on the PEAs from overSEAs...

Happy Christmas, Jess!
Enjoy your time with the family and friends this week. I'm praying that your mother feels better.

VnyrdWrshp; 9:57 AM
Jess said...: JESS!!!! Congratulations on finishing strong this semester! I knew you could do it! Way to go!! Now, if you can just find some presents. I got yours a while ago...I've just been really slow in mailing it. It will go out tomorrow, though, I promise. Hope you like it! Have a wonderful day, my dear, and again, congratulations!!!!! :) :) :); 11:29 AM
Jess said...: Oh and P.S. YOU DO NOT HAVE TO BUY ME ANYTHING FOR CHRISTMAS!!!! :); 3:13 PM
Jess said...: Thanks for the thought, shlxewsfl. But please, I would very much appreciate it if you would take that back to Gander Mountain or wherever you picked it up, POST-HASTE!

You know, that is such a misnomer, post-haste...the post does not seem to have much haste these days. But I am getting off track.

As you said, shlxewsfl, it's the thought that counts when giving gifts, right? That's why so many people re-gift, I suppose...

I could always put that deer head up next to the antler-on-a-plaque I have on the wall or near my deluxe tanned beaver skin.

(I found the antler lying on the road one day, not too far from where I hit the doe. I have never shot a deer in my life, though when the deer in the backyard were chewing up my little maple tree I planted, I was tempted.)

Anyway! No, dear shlxewsfl, I have not figured out what it all stands for. I know the x must stand for xanthochroid...I suppose I will just have to skim back through all the old posts and comments to find clues as to all the rest of your letters.; 9:13 AM

Movie Night In...I love a good movie!

Mega Mind
Taking Chance (Will make you cry like a baby)
Charlotte Grey (A bit of a different take on Nazi Germany)
Series - Merlin (I LOVE BBC)
Robin Hood (Okay, a love Russell Crowe, you'll have to understand that about me...)
Kingdom of Heaven (Chuck full of acting power with an epic tale)
Miss Potter (Such a great film! Story of the creator of Peter Rabbit)
How to Train your Dragon (Possibly my favorite animated movie ever...I'm like a little kid, I watch it over and over)
Buck (Sundance winner, Biography of Horse Trainer, heart touching)
Lost in Austin (Modern day spin on Pride and Prej.)

Life as a nurse...

Great words by Reb Jeff: Vayishlach: Facing Death

"Rachel died. She was buried on the road to Ephrat — now called Bethlehem. Jacob set up a pillar above her grave. It is the pillar at Rachel’s grave to this day."–Genesis 35:19-20

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vidui http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shiva_(Judaism), and preparing the notifications to the community, feel like little fragments of the sacred. I have been entrusted with the care and tending of the most powerful, complex and difficult emotions that a person can experience in life. I have been made, in some small part, a guardian of the memory of a departed soul — a life that touches upon many other lives.After dropping off my older daughter at her high school this morning, I made a stop at Treasure Coast Hospice http://www.tchospice.org/, a remarkable organization that sets a very high standard for the loving and respectful care of the dying. There, I visited a lovely man whom I have seen a few times in his hospice room. I sat by his bedside and listened to him (in full possession of his faculties) as he told me about his worries about his family, the support of his wife after he is gone, and the future of his children and grandchildren. I was deeply moved by the way he put any concern for himself — even while facing death — in a distant backseat to his concerns for his family. When my own time comes, I can only hope to have his awareness of the way that one life can touch so many others.Also at hospice, I visited a woman I have known for the past two years — a dear soul who is a former Jewish religious school director. I sat with her, too, singing psalms to her as I listened to her heavy and labored breathing. I have no medical training, but I have come to know the sound of a person who is close to death. The body begins to fight for each breath as it slowly looses it grasp on life. As I held her hand and sang, I realized that being a rabbi is no protection against becoming one of the people caught in the web of connection. I, too, am changed by the loss of a life that has touched mine.Later in the day, I met with a couple from our congregation. She had just learned that her brother died yesterday in a car crash. Coming to terms with the loss is made more difficult for her by the fact that she and her brother had not seen each other or spoken in five years. Sometimes, people think it is easier to mourn the death of someone who has moved out of your life. In my experience, though, it's harder. Grief is magnified by wounded love and regret. I have no magic words to say to ease the pain of mourning. All I can do is listen, become a vessel in which people place their stories, and offer compassion.Actually, there is one more thing I can do. I can have faith that "all I can do" is all that I need to do. It is enough.In this week's Torah portion (Vayishlach) Jacob watched Rachel, the love of his life, die in childbirth. He was overcome by grief. Jacob had worked for his cruel uncle Laban for fourteen years to earn the right to marry Rachel. Now she was gone. Because she died while they were traveling, Jacob had to bury her by the side of the road. He built a pillar of stones on the spot to mark the place as sacred.This is what we all do, in one way or another, when death enters our lives. We grieve and our hearts break. We wish that we could continue to walk along the path of life with our loved ones forever, but the dead cannot fully join us. We have to leave something behind in order to resume our own journey. So, what do we do? We mark the moment as sacred. We erect monuments — both in cemeteries and in our hearts. The stones we place on top of stones remind us that a life may end, but its sanctity is forever.The Torah says that the monument Jacob built for his beloved continues to stand until this day. A life that touches the lives of others never ceases to send living reverberations throughout the web that binds us all.