Reflections in Advent
I enter Advent this year looking forward to the Christmas holiday and to strengthening my faith and spirituality. There were some challenges this year, some fun times, some sad times, and some stuff for which I really am thankful.
I would hope that I have more appreciation and willingness to reach out to the hungry and the sick as I now have no gallbladder and fatty food is a recipe for suffering. I hope I have more compassion as I had to nurse Hugh through a kidney stone and pneumonia. I hope I have more endurance and skill as I had to endure the project from Hell at work. I hope I have more sympathy and compassion for the bereft as I lost three great-aunts in the space of the past year.
I am thankful my surgery went well and my surgeon, Sharon Goldstein at St. Margaret's, Pittsburgh, is so skilled and sympathetic. I am thankful Hugh is recovering and merely is dealing with his arthritis and post-nasal drip. I am thankful that the project has concluded successfully and I am ready for the next challenge and that I have a job in this uncertain economic climate. I am thankful I still have so many of my family, plus a new nephew/godson, a new brother-in-law, and more friends than ever before.
I miss my friends and my Church family in Cincinnati, but I have gained so many in Pittsburgh. It is so providential that we found a parish so much like Calvary, Clifton as we have in Redeemer, Squirrel Hill.
I have been able to travel more this year than any year previous. I am so glad I have had a chance to network with new friends and old. I am glad my husband is with me and that my cats are healthy, even if they can't stand each other. I am glad I have transportation, food, shelter, clothing, and utilities. So many of us have so little. So as we Christians look forward to the immanence of God in the seasons of Christmas and Epiphany, as my Jewish friends celebrate God's mercy and providence in Hannukah, and all my other friends are caught up in the general cheer of the season I wish you all many blessings this next year and in the years to come.
I would hope that I have more appreciation and willingness to reach out to the hungry and the sick as I now have no gallbladder and fatty food is a recipe for suffering. I hope I have more compassion as I had to nurse Hugh through a kidney stone and pneumonia. I hope I have more endurance and skill as I had to endure the project from Hell at work. I hope I have more sympathy and compassion for the bereft as I lost three great-aunts in the space of the past year.
I am thankful my surgery went well and my surgeon, Sharon Goldstein at St. Margaret's, Pittsburgh, is so skilled and sympathetic. I am thankful Hugh is recovering and merely is dealing with his arthritis and post-nasal drip. I am thankful that the project has concluded successfully and I am ready for the next challenge and that I have a job in this uncertain economic climate. I am thankful I still have so many of my family, plus a new nephew/godson, a new brother-in-law, and more friends than ever before.
I miss my friends and my Church family in Cincinnati, but I have gained so many in Pittsburgh. It is so providential that we found a parish so much like Calvary, Clifton as we have in Redeemer, Squirrel Hill.
I have been able to travel more this year than any year previous. I am so glad I have had a chance to network with new friends and old. I am glad my husband is with me and that my cats are healthy, even if they can't stand each other. I am glad I have transportation, food, shelter, clothing, and utilities. So many of us have so little. So as we Christians look forward to the immanence of God in the seasons of Christmas and Epiphany, as my Jewish friends celebrate God's mercy and providence in Hannukah, and all my other friends are caught up in the general cheer of the season I wish you all many blessings this next year and in the years to come.