So, here we are. I'm a Kiwi. That's what we call ourselves in New Zealand. And I'm in New Zealand for the second Christmas in a row. If I'm honest I feel really spoilt and I should because I am. The rubble and bumpy roads can't hide love and sun, family and clean water. Hospitality is common here but no less hospitable and more so in many ways. It's 10:25pm and a man I look up to just said he feels Christmasy after a Christmas movie. Me, I feel Christmasy too, because of him and his family. I'm a lucky guy and I sit, trying not to get in the way of this household routine on a comfy couch in a corner with a special vantage. I see this family work together and laugh and share and do stuff only a family can do. I am lucky and they are good.
I've been shopping today. Most have. There is a rush still going on out there even at this time. We passed it coming home from the pub. A sticky floor pub. My kind. There are people out there having fun and some not. There are people splashing out some some over extending. There are Mums and Dads, husbands and wives heading in different directions for sneaky surprises and some just having to make promises for next year. The better year. I feel more like that. I never think I do enough, be enough, buy enough, think enough and remember enough. I'm right too. I don't and can't. I'm just not very good by comparison and believe me, I have good comparison. My heros hold me to shame and so they should but I try my best and always will. But my shopping was not for Christmas. We did our humble mission a few weeks back and now I just cross my fingers that under that colourful paper is a thank you that might ring true. I cross them again. We bought flowers and ribbon and paper puffy ball things for a church. We bought flowers for two beautiful ladies to brandish and honourable gents to flash. We bought pure white for warning, this is the end of the pew. I solemnly declared truths to an official much younger than I and we drove in heavy steel queues. We bought miniature British flags for luck and spoke with a fine woman who to all this is routine. We planned our wedding.
It's weeks away yet, well, two. Well almost two, but it's just like tomorrow for so many. It's a common reference. An olive branch, a rainbow, a book or a ring. It's a statement and a promise, a smile and a hand shake. It's just a very simple thing dressed like the Emperor. I hope that's OK to say. I hope it doesn't sound like I don't dig it because I mean the opposite. I mean I know truly what it is. I mean I know that beneath all the glitz and cake, the wrapping and pine, beneath the ceiling and ceremony, that these days, tomorrow and my wed, are nothing without the people. Nothing without kind whispers, nothing without love and nothing without your smiles. So like others of it's kind, tomorrow and this day in a couple of weeks is set aside. It's there so people like me, who get caught up in other days' toil and competing with ourselves and television standards, will take it out and spend it wisely. We'll sit and talk. We'll share and give. We'll tell each other how important we are and listen while better people tell us the same and be amazed and humbled. These are good days and every one of them should be taken.
I hope where ever you are things are good. I hope you have time and some cash left. I hope your family invited you round and your friends are well. I hope tomorrow is relaxed and honest and that honest is kind. I hope you have a good day and take time to remember someone who's not there. I hope Christmas is more than Christmas. I hope it is a family day and a friends day.
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